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106
COLLECTION OF HOUSE REFUSE.
The Tables give the chief data relating to Refuse Collection.
There is little to add to what has been said in previous years with
reference to this province of sanitary administration. The contract
price is one which has been particularly favourable to the Council if
it be compared with that charged a few years back. It is satisfactory
to note that the saving in cost has not been at the expense of efficiency
in the collection.
Although the amount of refuse collected per house tends to fall,
this is due to the fact that the distinction between trade and house
refuse has been more strictly observed. On the whole this has led
to an improved sanitary condition of the premises from which trade
refuse was previously collected as house refuse. Provision for burning
considerable quantities of decomposable trade refuse has been made by
many of the tradesmen, and instead of a weekly accumulation
having to be removed by the dust carts, a small quantity of ashes,
the result of daily combustions, is all that it is now necessary to
remove.
The Tables have all been re-calculated from more accurate data.
Instead of taking the number of houses in the district as that ascertained
at Midsummer the number existing at Michaelmas has been
taken as the basis of calculation. This is rendered necessary by the
fact that the year for the collection of house refuse commences in
March and not in January as is the case with the other periods for
which statistical returns are given. The mid-yearly period for the
year commencing March is of course Michaelmas and not Midsummer.