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24
Medical Officers of Health Annual Report.
The Board of Works for the Wandsworth District.
THE FACTORY AND WORKSHOP ACT, 1895.
To the Sanitary Committee.
We beg to point out to you the following changes in the law,
in so far as they affect the Sanitary Department, brought about by
the above Act, which comes into operation on the 1st of January
next.
Section 1—Contains a valuable definition of what constitutes
overcrowding in a workshop, so that if there is not a cubic space
of 250 feet for each worker (or 400 when overtime is worked)
there is a nuisance under section 2 of the Public Health (London)
Act. There is also provision enabling the Secretary of State in
certain trades, when he thinks fit, to increase the necessary cubic
space. It is also required that a notice be hung in each room specifying
the number of persons who may be employed in that room
—that is for whom there is sufficient cubic spaoe.
Section 2—Gives a court of summary jurisdiction power to
close a workshop (in those cases only when proceedings cannot be
taken by any Sanitary Authority under the Public Health Acts)
on complaint of an Inspector (Factory Inspector), when the manufacturing
process cannot be carried on without danger to health, to
life, or limb.
Section 3—Imposes on Sanitary Authorities the new duty of
reporting to the Inspector the steps they have taken in consequence
of notice of an insanitary condition in a workshop being given to
them under section 4 of the Factory and Workshop Act, 1878.
It also defines the "reasonable time" during which they are to
investigate, and if necessary remedy, the matter complained of as
"one month."
Section 6—Imposes a penalty on the occupier of a factory,
workshop, or laundry who causes or allows wearing apparel to be
made, cleaned, or repaired in any dwelling house or building
where there is a case of scarlet fever or smallpox.