View report page

38
Rag Flock Act, 1911.
In my last annual report I pointed out that the decisions of the
High Court which had been given in regard to this Act had practically
rendered that Act inoperative so far as Hampstead was concerned.
Additional decisions have been given this year but they all trend in the
same direction. It is a matter for regret that an Act which promised
to be one of the most useful enactments so far as domestic sanitation
was concerned should have produced such disappointing results. It
woidd have been no hardship to anyone to have compelled them to
destroy any dirty rag flock in whatever form it might have found its
way into the home.
Only one sample was taken during the year, and that was upon
request of a ratepayer who had purchased a new flock mattress, but I
am glad to be able to report that the analysis showed that the flock
conformed to the regulations in every respect.
Public Mortuary.
During the year, the bodies of 80 persons were brought to the
mortuary, being 27 less than the number in 1913,—44 by order of the
Coroner, 17 by the Police, and 19 at the request of friends of the
deceased persons.
In 57 instances (or 71 per cent. of the bodies admitted) inquests
were held, and in 37 instances (or 46 per cent.) post-mortem examinations
were made.

Two of the bodies received at the Mortuary were those of still-born
children, and in one case where an open verdict was returned the body
was so decomposed that it was impossible to ascertain whether the child
was born alive or not, or to which sex it belonged.
7 O