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72
Annual Report of the London County Council, 1911.

A detailed report on the subject was printed and placed on sale,
Water supply.
In his sixth annual report Dr. Houston refers to the passing of the Metropolitan Water Board
(New Works) Act and the Thames Conservancy Act, 1911, and comments on the deletion from the
former Act of the clause conferring an "unrestricted right" to abstract 130 million gallons of water
daily from the Thames. He quotes figures to show the loss of water that occurred in 1906, an excepttionally
dry year, and points out that any circumstance which prevents or curtails abstraction of river
water during drought means the provision of increased storage accommodation, and may mean that
the water taken into store is of inferior quality. Several reasons are advanced in support of this latter
contention. Periods of drought are usually associated with bright sunshine and warm weather, and
Dr. Houston states that his experiments show that the typhoid bacillus in water dies much more
rapidly in summer as compared with winter temperatures. Dr. Houston continues as follows :—
"Again it should be noted that curtailment of abstraction powers during drought must coincidently
lead to serious depletion of the reservoirs, and so when the floods come subsequently there is the
temptation to abstract water of unsatisfactory quality, which entering partially empty reservoirs, of
course cannot be fit for filtration purposes for some time afterwards." From the experience gained
during the drought of 1911, Dr. Houston infers that high temperatures need not necessarily result in
"algal" troubles. Some remarks are moreover made on the respective merits of sand filters and
mechanical filters, and it is stated that bacteriological tests did not demonstrate perfect efficiency of
the former under strenuous conditions of working.
Dr. Houston concludes by stating that to a progressively increasing extent the safety of
London's water supply is being secured,but expresses the opinion that the "quality policy" of the Metropolitan
Water Board should be directed towards securing an "epidemiologically sterile" water antecedent
to filtration by means of storage (sedimentation, devitalisation and equalisation) aided, if need
be, by the occasional employment of supplementary processes of water purification.
Health visitors.
During the year 1910 owing "to the small and rapidly sinking surplus on the Exchequer
Contribution Account" the Council felt itself obliged to attach the following conditions to contributions
by the Council to salaries of health visitors, viz. :—
(1) That the contributions are for one year only.
(2) That the contributions are dependent upon there being sufficient surplus on the
Exchequer Contribution Account to enable payments to be made after making provision for the
discharge of the existing statutory charges on that account in full; and
(3) That in the event of the available surplus being insufficient to meet the payments
in full the Council's contribution will be liable to abatement or may be discontinued altogether.
On 4th July, 1911, the Finance Committee advised the Council that the Exchequer Contribution
Account was likely to show a deficiency each year in future, in which event no payments would be
possible towards the salaries of health visitors. It was estimated that the deficiency in respect of the
financiall year 1910-11 would probably amount to £31,000, and that in view of the conditions attached
to the contributions made in the year 1909-10, it would not be possible to make any payment for
the year 1910-11.