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116
Annual Report of the London County Council, 1911.
details is filled up by the nurse for each child still unclean. This is forwarded to the divisional superintendent,
who has the card delivered at the home by the attendance officer. At the end of the second
week, the assistant to the superintendent of school nurses visits the school and examines these children,
who, if still unclean, are excluded. After exclusion the divisional superintendent takes out a summons
under the Attendance By-laws; but if any child is properly cleansed before the hearing, it is re-admitted
to school, examined by the nurse and the summons is not pressed, the circumstances being
explained to the magistrate.

The parents of 315 children were prosecuted, and fines varying from 2s. 6d. to £1 imposed. The
percentage of children found to be verminous to children examined, was 14.2 in 1911, as compared with
22.4 per cent. in 1910.
The head cleansing scheme was commenced under the School Board. It still gives very good
results in districts where the cleansing stations are not in operation. The hair nowadays is much
better cared for, and this cleansing scheme is very useful among the better class children who could not
be sent to the cleansing centres and would often remain infected if not dealt with under the scheme.
Often a medical certificate is obtained that the child is free from infectious disease, sometimes indeed
from all "traces of vermin;" supported by these the parents are naturally indignant with the-nurse's
judgment which, however, is generally correct. The strictness shown towards scholarship candidates
in respect of cleanliness of the head has reacted on the elementary and secondary schools. Only a
very small proportion of scholarship children are rejected on this account and they are generally
undesirable on other grounds.
Elementary
Schools—
Verminous
persons and
clothing.
As stated above, the Council has decided to exercise the powers for the cleansing of verminous
children conferred upon it by the London County Council (General Powers) Act, 1907, and the Children
Act, 1908. Clause 3 of Section 122 of the Children Act provides that the local education authority
may require the local sanitary authority to permit the use of premises and appliances erected for the
cleansing of the person or the clothing of persons infested with vermin. In view of this clause the
Council has entered into agreements with nine sanitary authorities (City, Stoke Newington, Hackney,
Poplar, Bermondsey, Camberwell, St. Marylebone, Hampstead, Woolwich) and is negotiating with
five others (Battersea, Greenwich, Westminster, St. Pancras, Southwark) for the use of such premises
and appliances. The agreements stipulate inter alia that the sanitary authority shall cleanse children
attending elementary schools who shall be sent to the station by the Council, usually at the rate of 2s. a
head for any number of cleansings within one calendar month from the date of the child's first attendance.
In addition to these arrangements the Council has five stations (Finch-street, " Chaucer," Bath-street,
Fountain-road, Sedlescombe-road) and is adapting premises or negotiating for the use of premises
in four other instances, viz., Frankham-street, Lauriston-road, Pakeman-street and Sirdar-road.
The scheme adopted provides that the school nurse visits the school, examines all tne children
who are in a foul or filthy condition and supplies to the head teacher for each child a card drawing
attention to the condition found. The card is placed in a sealed envelope and given to the children to
take home. The school nurse forwards to the nurse in charge of the cleansing station to which the
school contributes the names of the children concerned. After 48 hours, the nurse in charge of the
cleansing station visits the school and examines all children who have had cards, and those cases not
cleansed are separated from the other children. The divisional superintendent is asked to serve upon
the parent or guardian a statutory notice requiring the parent or guardian properly to cleanse the
child, and the medical officer of health for the district in which the child resides is notified so that the
home may be dealt with under the London County Council (General Powers) Act, 1904, Part IV., if
necessary. When 24 hours have elapsed after the serving of this notice, the nurse again examines the
children, and conveys those still unclean to the cleansing station for compulsory cleansing. An
opportunity is afforded to the children to attend at the cleansing station voluntarily. If a child
again attends school in a verminous or foul condition after having been compulsorily cleansed at a
station, the divisional superintendent is asked (1) to serve a second statutory notice requiring the parent
or guardian properly to cleanse the child and (2) to take police court proceedings against the parents.
A complete report on the scheme cannot be made until all the projected stations are working, as
until the scheme is complete, separate stations are so overworked that the results in the individual schools
are not satisfactory. But the definite improvement in schools which are well situated with regard to
cleansing is more than can be expressed in figures of children cleansed. The children come better clad,
and where, at the first glance almost, the nurses used to find all the garments infested with vermin, they