View report page

Report of the Medical Officer of Health. 81
is efficiently supervised. The Sanitary Inspectors have during
the year made inspections of these premises, and only in one
instance, at Totterdown Stables, Tooting, had any notice to be
served for nuisance arising from the non-removal of manure.
525 dustbins were provided or repaired, compared with 729
in 1900, and 369 complaints (83 from Clapham, 68 from Putney,
90 from Streatham, 15 from Tooting, and 113 from Wandsworth)
were received during the year. The great majority of these complaints
were, as far as could be ascertained, trivial, and largely due
to the fact that the occupants were out when the dustman called.
The Surveyors under whose inspection the dusting and
scavenging for the Borough is carried out have given me the
following information: —
In the Eastern District, comprising Clapham, Balham,
Streatham, and Tooting, dust, together with that from the
Southern portion of Clapham, is burnt at the Council's
Destructor at Tooting.
Mr. Marten, the Surveyor for the District, reported in
1900 that the Destructor was completed and working in a
very satisfactory manner, also that a low-level platform and
automatic feeding apparatus had been added, so that the
refuse was discharged direct from the pans into the furnaces.
In the Eastern District there is a weekly collection,
but, at the discretion of the Surveyor, certain premises, including
flats, are cleared two or three times a week.
In some parts of the Borough, especially in Clapham,
Balham, and Putney, as in other parts of London, residential
flats are being rapidly erected, and the removal of dust from
these is a question often of serious and increasing difficulty.
These flats are not, in the majority of cases, occupied by the
working classes, and in many no adequate provision has been
made for the storage of dust for one week. In some shoots
had been constructed, but they were soon found to be a
source of serious nuisance, and other means had to be
adopted. More frequent removal has, as already stated, been