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168
or at the back of residential houses. Many of these are of long
standing and associated with the early industries of Clerkenwell and
the parish of St. Luke, such as jewellery, watchmaking, plating, etc.
Many of such workshops are not kept as cleanly as they might well
be. This is partly due to deterioration of premises and decline of
trade, and partly to their situation. It is almost impossible to
maintain cleanliness in small sheds in back yards. Sometimes too,
the processes themselves are of a nature to make cleanliness difficult.
Perhaps 30 or 40 per cent. of these workshops are open to criticism
on account of uncleanliness. During the year 118 workshops have
been found to require notices for cleansing.
(b) Air Space.—Taking the standard of 250 cubic feet per head as
laid down in Section 3 of the Act, it may be said that
few Finsbury workshops have been found in 1904 to be overcrowded.
In only 5 cases has it been necessary to issue notices. In other
cases a slight re-arrangement of workers has provided that each
person shall have at least 250 cubic feet. In many of the large
workshops the air space provided is liberal. In general, workshops
in Finsbury are not ventilated by fan or other artificial means.
•
Nine notices have been sent to the Home Office in respect of factories
and workshops which were not effectually heated. By our
instructions 21 gas stoves, etc., have been provided with hoods or
flues.
(c) Ventilation.—It has already been pointed out in previous reports
that the majority of workshops in Finsbury are provided with
sufficient means of ventilation, but that a certain number of them
do not conform to the section of the Act (7-i), which requires that
"sufficient ventilation shall be maintained." The means of ventilation
provided are not always taken advantage of, and it is no easy
matter to compel their use. If the windows of a workshop are open
at the time of inspection, the persons responsible appear to be
doing their best to maintain a pure atmosphere; and without a
chemical test of the air, the period during which the available
means of ventilation have been in use must remain a matter of
conjecture. An apparatus has lately come into use by which the
amount of carbonic acid gas present in the air of any room can be