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into the Rivers by the most efficacious methods that science
and experience may dictate, and to enforce the adequate
storage and filtration of such water as is abstracted at the
intakes.
There can be no possible doubt that at the present time
much filth of various kinds is discharged unnecessarily and
illegally into the rivers ; and steps should be forthwith taken to
put an end to this. The London County Council engage three
Medical Officers of Health to inspect personally the whole course
of the Thames and Lea and their tributaries, and to report in
detail as to all sources of pollution they might detect. These
three gentlemen appeared before us as witnesses, and handed in
complete lists of the pollutions observed by them during their
inspection.
The pollutions mentioned are very numerous, as might
naturally be expected, seeing that all that were detected, however
trivial they might be, were entered in the account, and that,
including the tributaries, many hundreds of miles of watercourse
must have been examined. The point, however, to which we
especially wish to direct attention, is that in a very large proportion
of the cases the pollution recorded was preventible and
illegal, being in direct contravention of the Rivers Pollution
Prevention Act, of which one of these witnesses stated that
“all through the country I think the Rivers Pollution Prevention
Act has been more or less a dead letter. I do not think it has
been put in force in many instances.”
Some advances, however, have been made during the past
25 years in the construction of sewage works in the valleys of
the Thames and Lea. Where such works have been constructed
on an efficient system the sewage can be so effectually dealt
with at all times, except times of flood, that the effluents are
clear and innocuous. We understand that in some of the places
which still require sewage farms or works for the efficient treatment
of sewage operations are already in progress for providing