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147
With regard to the drainage of houses, it would be a most
important and advantageous step to take were your Vestry to
compel builders to have the drain pipes, &c., inspected before being
covered in, as I find that in many of the newest houses in the district
complaints of the smells arising from defective drains are
caused either from the joints in the pipes not being properly
cemented, or from leakage due to the use of old pipes.
GIPSIES.
These nomadic residents, but non-ratepayers of the parish,
have been the source of a great deal of trouble to your Sanitary
Department. In one instance a serious outbreak of enteric fever
was threatened, and were it not for the prompt action taken in
removing to the mortuary the body of one of the members who hav
died from the disease, where removal to hospital was refused while
alive, and the compulsory removal to hospital under a threat of a
magistrate's order of two other members of the family afflicted with
the disease, a serious outbreak might have been the result.
Every effort has been made to disburse their encampments
but, with the exception of the ground at the end of Halford-road
belonging to Colonel Gunter. who fenced it in, the result is far from
satisfactory, as no sooner are they driven from one place than they
move to another, only to return to their previous locality again as
soon as disturbed in the other.
Those who have the chief complaint against these interlopers
are the owners and residents of the house property in the neighbourhood
where they encamp, and were they to refuse a supply of
water to the various vans and tents (a matter which should be
taken up by the water companies), the gipsies could not remain on
their camping ground.
In one instance, that of O'Connor's ground in Greyhound-road,
a property quite a nuisance enough in itself without the tents and
vans of the unwholesome sojourners, rent is taken by the owner,
which renders it still more difficult to deal with.
Your Vestry may, however, be assured that every legitimate
step will be taken to get the parish clear of them, but without the
co-operation of the owners of the land and the occupiers of houses
adjoining their encampments, the task is a difficult one.