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171
REFUSE MATTER.
The prevention of nuisance in connection with the storage,
the collection, and the conveyance through streets of offensive
substances coming under the general description, "Refuse,"
which was formerly a matter of no little difficulty, has been
facilitated by the County Council's bye-laws made in 1893,
under the provisions of section 16 of the Public Health
(London) Act, 1891. But in order to prevent nuisance in the
conveyance of offensive matter through the streets constant
supervision is necessary, and as the police are always on duty,
and have therefore opportunities for observing offences against
the bye-laws, it appeared to the Public Health Committee of
the Council that it would be useful if the police were instructed
to take note of any such offences, and to give notice thereof
to the sanitary authority of the district concerned. The committee
communicated their views to the Commissioner, who
thereupon issued an instruction to the police to note, and
report to the sanitary authorities, any breaches of the byelaws
made under the Act, and this is sometimes done.
House Refuse.—The work of collection of ashes and
miscellaneous rubbish from our 23,000 inhabited houses, has
been systematised by division of the parish into districts, and
provision has been made for inspection of dust-bins, and oversight
of the dusting-gangs, the arrangements being under the
supervision of the surveyor. A call is (or should be) made at
every house once a week—twice a week in the "Notting-dale"
district—and, subject to removal on that basis, further improvement
is scarcely possible, until the objectionable practice
of refuse-harbourage shall have given place to the more
rational system of daily collection from moveable receptacles.
Nuisance from house refuse does not arise from the proper
contents of the receptacle—ashes—but from the addition
thereto of matters of organic origin. With the object of