View report page

17
Annual Report of the Medical Officer of Health-1897
This number includes bodies brought from the St. George's Workhouse.
Post-mortem examinations and inquests were held in 97 cases, and inquests alone in 16 cases.
During 1897, 13 young children were suffocated whilst lying iu bed with their
parents, as against 15 in 1896. This lamentable loss of life might have been prevented
had these unfortunate children slept in cots.
The Factory and Workshop Act, 1891.
446 Workshops have been registered by your Authority since January, 1892,
when the Act first came into operation. Of this number 43 have been added during
the past year.
The Order remains only partly enforced in this parish, and will continue so
unless some means be devised to lighten the more pressing duties of the Sanitary
Inspectors.
In my Reports for 1893, 1894, 1895 and 1896. I said, that in my opinion, a special
inspector would be required to carry the Order out thoroughly in your district.
This view of the question I would again respectfully urge upon the attention of
your Vestry, especially considering the added duties imposed by the 1895 Act of Mr.
Asquith.
The Factory and Workshop Act, 1895.
The chief points may be briefly touched upon. First and foremost the Act
provides that a factory or workshop shall be deemed overcrowded if there be less than
250 feet of cubic space to each person during the hours of work, and of 400 cubic feet
during overtime.
It authorises a Magistrate, on complaint of an Inspector, and being satisfied that
a factory or workshop is in a dangerous or injurious condition, to prohibit the place
from being used until such works as are necessary to remove the danger have been
executed. Adequate penalties are provided against the employment of persons in
work injurious to health, or for allowing wearing apparel to be made up, cleaned, or
repaired in places where there is scarlet fever or small pox. It also directs that a full
notification and register of deaths from accident be kept by owners or occupiers, and
that the Factory Inspector attend the subsequent inquest, while the Home Secretary
is furnished with powers for additional investigation if he deem fit.
Numerous provisions have been made with a view to enforcing the duties of
employers in the observance of sanitation, of the fencing of machines, of the affixing
of notices, and of the general carrying out of their responsibilities under the Act.
It is worthy of special note, that in the case of tenement factories the owner is
made responsible in place of the occupier.
Housing of the Working Classes Act, 1890.
Under Part 1, I have suggested that two areas should be dealt with as "unhealthy"
as defined by the Act. These areas are:—(1) Grotto Place, Lower Grotto
Place, Goldsmiths Place, and Lant Place. (2) Area bounded by (a) Pocock Street,
(b) King's Bench Walk, (c) Wellington Place and (d) the new buildings of the London
County Council in Greon Street, and by the Pocock Street Board.
References to these suggestions will be found in my official weekly diary
presented to the Health Sub-Committee on the dates 12th July, 19th and 29th
November, 1897.