Table 6 (Appendix) contains a summary of the principal items of sanitary
work accomplished during the Vestry year ended 25th March, 1875. The
number of complaints received and entered in the complaint book was
1,482; viz., 820 in the North, and 662 in the South Sanitary District.
Seven thousand two hundred and eighty-six houses were inspected—viz.,
3,229 in the North, and 4,057 in the South district, besides mews, of
which there are about 140 in the parish. The number of sanitary notices
served for the amendment of houses, premises, &c., was 1,438, viz., 756
in the North and 682 in the South: 1,477 houses and premises were
cleansed, &c.: 68 were disinfected after infectious diseases. The drains
of 442 houses were cleansed and repaired; and trapped and ventilated in
341 other cases: 463 privies and water-closets were repaired and supplied
with water; and 6 new water-closets were provided: 31 new dust-bins were
erected, and 41 old ones covered, repaired, &c.: 8 water-cisterns were
constructed, and 75 cleansed, covered and repaired—a very inadequate
number it would seem, so far as regards cleansing, only that in a great
number of cases this operation—so commonly neglected—was directed and
carried out without formal notice: 115 accumulations of dung, stagnant
water, animal and other refuse were removed, and in 58 cases animals
improperly kept, or kept in unfit localities (swine especially), were
removed.
The number of inspections in each district, and in each period of four
weeks, covered by my monthly reports, may be seen, in Table 6A. Legal
proceedings were had recourse to in 100 cases, viz., 82 in the North, and
18 in the South district, and generally with a successful result. A few
of the cases deserve special notice.
And first I will mention the subject of boiling food for pigs. A greater
nuisance than this is, it would be difficult to imagine in a parish like
Kensington. The effluvia given off from the boiling of a quantity of
animal and vegetable refuse, collected from the wash-tubs, and often in a
semi-putrid state before cooking, is sickening and offensive to the last
degree. It constitutes by far the greater part of the nuisance arising
from the keeping of swine in an improper locality; and the efforts
persistently made during the last four years to improve the condition of
the Potteries have been sadly marred by the continuance of the process of
food collection and preparation, which still goes on to some extent,
although nearly all the swine have been removed. As no means were ever
adopted to prevent the escape into the air of the noxious effluvia
resulting from the cooking, we resolved to attack the nuisance under the
27th section of the Nuisances Removal Act, which enacts, in effect, that
“If any building, or place for boiling offal . . . or used for any
trade, business, &c., causing effluvia, be at any time certified to
the local authority by any Medical Officer to be a nuisance or
injurious to the health of the inhabitants of the neighbourhood, and
that the person carrying on such business shall not have used the
best practicable means for abating such nuisance, or preventing or
counteracting such effluvia, the person so offending shall, upon a
summary conviction for such offence, forfeit and pay a sum of not
more than Five Pounds nor less than Forty Shillings, and upon a
second conviction for such offence the sum of Ten Pounds, and for
each subsequent conviction a sum double the amount of the penalty
imposed for the last preceding conviction, but the highest amount of
such penalty shall not in any case exceed the sum of Two Hundred
Pounds.”
Several prosecutions were undertaken successfully—fines varying from
Forty Shillings to Five Pounds (including costs) being inflicted. The
steps already taken will, it is hoped, prove sufficient, and render
unnecessary any further appeal to the law, especially as a notice of your
Vestry’s intention to proceed against offenders in every case has been
widely distributed in the Potteries.
Twenty-four convictions were obtained against old offenders for keeping
swine in an improper locality, and Mr. Bridge, one of the magistrates at
the Hammersmith police-court, announced his intention of throwing on the
defendants in any future cases that might be brought before him, the onus
of proving that the pigs were not on the premises on days intervening
between the days for which the defendants might be summoned for the
offence of keeping pigs in a place under the ban of a “prohibitory
order,” the penalty for this offence being Ten Shillings a day. Hitherto
we have been required to prove the presence of swine on each day, so
that, for example, to obtain in one week penalties to the amount of three
pounds, it was necessary to visit the prohibited premises every day in
the week. But if Mr. Bridge should feel justified in carrying out his
views, it would only be necessary to visit the premises on Monday and
Saturday to obtain the same amount of penalties which would be imposed,
unless the defendant should be able to prove that the pigs were not on
the premises on the intervening days, viz., Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday,
and Friday.
The proprietor of a licensed slaughter-house in the Potteries,
Notting-hill, was fined in the sum of Ten pounds and costs for having on
the premises the carcase of a cow, diseased and unfit for human food.
The cow had been brought dead from another place, and after seizure it
was stated that the carcase was not intended for food. But it was
dressed in the usual way, and the meat having been condemned by Mr.
Ingham, proceedings were taken before Mr. Bridge, with the result above
stated, the magistrate ruling that the fact of the carcase being in the
slaughterhouse was sufficient evidence of the intention to pass it off as
food for man. The cow, it may be added, having died, or been killed, at
a licensed cow-shed in the same locality, I pointed out to the licensee
the great impropriety of his proceedings, and the risk he would run of
losing his license, to say nothing of other consequences, on a repetition
of his indiscretion. Subsequently, I received notice from the proprietor
of a licensed slaughter-house that the carcase of another cow that had
been killed in the last stage of the “lung disease” (pleuro-pneumonia)
was awaiting my opinion of the fitness, or otherwise, of the meat for
human food. I condemned the meat, which was removed to a knacker’s yard.
No proceedings were taken in this case, but I cautioned the licensee not
to admit diseased animals—living or dead—on his premises at any future
time. Some time after the occurrence of this case I learnt, to my great
surprise, that the instructions issued by the Metropolitan Board of
Works, to the district veterinary cattle inspectors under the provisions
of the Contagious Diseases (Animals) Act authorised the removal of
diseased cows from cowsheds to a licensed slaughter-house for the purpose
of being killed; or if killed at the shed, of being dressed, there to
await the _fiat_ of the inspector as to the fitness, or otherwise, of the
meat for human food. This instruction seems to be at variance with the
slaughter-house bye-laws, to say nothing on the question of the propriety
of using for food the flesh of diseased animals. In the provinces it is
the practice, I believe, to destroy and bury animals affected with
pleuro-pneumonia; and I am under the impression that heavy fines have
been inflicted on persons for selling or exposing for sale the flesh of
such animals. In London cowkeepers are required, under a penalty for
neglect, to give notice to the Metropolitan Board of Works of the
occurrence of cases of pleuro-pneumonia; and they are entitled to
compensation from the Board to the extent of a moiety of the value of any
animals that may be killed with a view of “stamping out” the disease. It
follows that the larger the amount realized by the sale of the carcase,
for whatever purpose, whether for the food of man or of cats, the less is
the amount payable to the owner in the way of compensation.
The proprietor of the slaughter-house in the Potteries first referred to
above, was fined Five pounds and costs for allowing a large accumulation
of putrid blood, &c., to remain on the premises after his attention had
been repeatedly called to the necessity of properly storing and regularly
removing all such matters before they became offensive.
A seizure of meat unfit for human food was made at Norfolk Terrace—at a
mis-called “co-operative” store—and the defendant was fined Twenty pounds
and costs.
A person who had formerly kept a licensed cow-shed was fined Forty
shillings and costs for keeping cows for dairy purposes without a
license.
A somewhat serious nuisance having been complained of, arising at an iron
foundry at Notting Hill, from the escape of noxious fumes and grit from
the low but capacious chimney above the melting furnaces, I gave a
certificate to the effect necessary to found legal proceedings, which,
however, were not had recourse to, the proprietors of the foundry having
expressed their willingness to adopt any measures I might advise, with a
view to remove the cause of complaint. They have done this by carrying
up the shaft some 20 feet, and by the interposition of diaphragms to
intercept the fine grit carried up by the draught; and I hope that in the
result these measures will be found adequate for the purpose.