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97
Report on
Kitchens of Restaurants, Hotels, Coffee and
Tea Rooms, Dining and Supper Rooms,
Stewed Eel Shops, etc.
(Special Report by the Medical Officer of Healthy)
The case of Bennett v. Harding (1900, 2 Q.B. 397) affords a first
attempt at a legal definition of the term "workplace," not hitherto defined
in any Factory and Workshop (or other) Acts. Justices Grantham
and Channell held, on Appeal, that the word "workplace" should
include any "place where work is done permanently, and where people
assemble together to do work permanently of some kind or other."
By this decision, the powers of a Sanitary Authority in respect to workshops
and workplaces, as laid down in the Public Health and Factory
and Workshop Acts, are considerably extended, and it becomes clear
that the kitchens of all restaurants, hotels, coffee and tea rooms, dining
and supper rooms, stewed eel shops, etc., naturally come within the
definition as now given to "workplaces." It had long been felt that
such places would be found, on inspection, to be sanitarily unsatisfactory,
so as to require systematic and frequent inspection, and supervision—at
least, in the majority of cases.
Considering the large number of persons whose business compels
them to have the greater part of their food in public restaurants and
eating houses, it is of the greatest importance that precautions should
be taken to ensure the food being stored, or prepared, therein at all times
under wholesome and sanitary conditions. This can only be secured
by constant and careful inspections of the kitchens (and other places)
wherein such food is stored or prepared, and the powers necessary to
accomplish this are given in the Public Health Act (Sections 2 and 47)
and Factory and Workshops Act (Section 2), and are, to all intents
and purposes, sufficient, though, perhaps, on one or two minor points,
improvements might be made, and greater powers given, by future
legislation.
This special inspectorial work naturally falls to the duties of a Female
Inspector, and I arranged for Miss Gamble to make an inspection of
all such (known) places within the Borough of Lambeth, with a view