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204
1912]
FACTORY AND WORKSHOP ADMINISTRATION.
In compliance with the Factory and Workshop Act, Medical Officers
of Health are required to report annually on the manner in which the Act
is administered in the district of which they have charge. Furthermore, the
various sanitary authorities are required to keep registers of the workshops, to
transmit copies of the annual reports of their Medical Officers of Health on the
subject to the Secretary of State, as well as to the Local Government Board
and the London County Council.
The work performed under the Factory and Workshops Act, 1901 is not
second in importance to any other work performed by the Council's staff in as
much as the cleanliness, the proper ventilation, the provision of sanitary
accommodation, are matters of vital consequence to the well-being of the
workers in the factories, workplaces, laundries, bakehouses, and similar premises
in which men and women earn their daily bread.
Inspectors. The work devolving on the borough council under the Act
is undertaken by one male and two female inspectors, the former of whom
inspects all factories and workplaces in which males are employed, while the
duty of examining factories and workplaces, which include laundries, where
women are employed, devolves on one of the female inspectors, and on the
other that of inspecting the homes of outworkers, the kitchens of restaurants
and places where food is prepared. It will thus be seen that these inspections
are of a most important character, and that they involve matters, the neglect
of which may affect, not only the workers themselves, but the public.
Inspections and Visits. -The number of inspections and visits paid
was 10,655, as compared with 9,892 in the preceding year, and 11,004 in 1910.
The particulars of these inspections are as follows:—Factories (including
factory laundries), 484 ; workshops (including workshop laundries), 2,558;
workplaces other than outworkers' premises, 269; bakehouses, 536; kitchens of
restaurants, 342; outworkers' premises, 637 ; miscellaneous re-inspections and
calls, 5,829; total, 10,655 .
Notices served.—Arising out of these inspections, 371 intimation notices
and IT statutory notices were served for various causes. These notices
related to 1,433 defects, of which 1,415 had been remedied at the close of the
year. In addition, 26 notices were served in respect to outworkers' rooms
which were found in an unwholesome state.