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270
Report of the Medical Officer of Health.
"Moreover, on Wednesday last it was argued that the placing
of a label on a vessel containing cream related to the receptacle
containing cream provided by the seller and did not apply to a jug
which a purchaser produced and in which cream or preserved
cream was placed.
"Again under the Regulations a complaint has to be lcdged
in the name of the Town Clerk, whereas under the Food and Drugs
Acts it is in the name of the Inspector who takes the sample. There
may be two offences committed be the same defendant in respect to
the same article, viz.:—that he sold it as cream and not as preserved
cream, and being analysed and found to be preserved cream
and thereby the purchaser was prejudiced and that he sold it
in a vessel without affixing a label thereto, contrary to the Regulations.
On one summons he would be liable to a penalty not exceeding
£100, and on the other (which might be a much more serious
offence—cream being sold with a boron preservative and which
might be to the injury of the person consuming it)—a penalty of
only £20.
"It is to be regretted that the Food and Drugs Act was not
amended, which could have been done by a very short Act empowering
the Local Government Board to make bye-laws with regard to
the sale of cream. All such matters then would have been gathered
under one Act, whereas now reference has to be made to several
Public Health Acts, and as above-mentioned a penalty is prescribed
under an Act which has nothing whatever to do with the sale of
Cream or an article of food."
Butter and Margarine.
BUTTER.
584 samples of butter were submitted for analysis during the
year, of which 74 or 12.67 Per cent, were reported against, compared
with 25.4 per cent, in 1912, 16.4 per cent, in 1911, and 7.23 per cent,
in 1910,