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82
" Facing " of Rice.
On 17th December, 1913, the Council had before them a communication
from the Kensington Borough Council, dated 21st November, in which they
stated that they have had under consideration a report which was submitted
to the Local Government Board in 1909 by Dr. J. M. Hamill, one of the
Hoard's Inspectors, on the subject of "facing" and other methods of preparing
rice for sale. Dr. Hamill in his report pointed out that the presence in a food
like rice of quantities such as 1 to 2 per cent, of unsuitable and possibly irritating
mineral matter might in some cases be prejudicial to health, especially
as this food is often given in considerable quantities to infants and invalids.
He mentioned also that the practice was extending to other cereals, such as
pearl barley. Dr. Hamill turther stated that "if polishing is regarded as
permissible at all, on account of its trade advantages, it should only be tolerated
when the amount of mineral matter which is left in the rice by the polishing
process is so small as practically to be negligible," and suggested that "an
outside limit of not more than 0.5 per cent, of mineral matter would seem
amply to meet the requirements of traders who represent this practice as
necessary." The Kensington Borough Council expressed the opinion that 0.5
per cent, of mineral matter cannot be said to "be so small as practically to be
negligible," if by that expression is meant 0.5 per cent, of extraneous mineral
matter, and mentioned that on that point Dr. Hamill's report does not contain
a definite statement. They further stated that they had reason to believe that
a considerable section of traders favour the entire prohibition of the practice
of treating rice and other cereal foods sold in this country with extraneous
mineral matter, and they had therefore communicated with the Local Government
Board urging that the addition of any mineral matter to rice should be
entirely prohibited, and they asked the Council to support their action.
In accordance with a resolution passed by the Council at that meeting, on
the recommendation of the Public Health Committee, a communication was
addressed to the Local Government Board in support of the views submitted
to them by the Kensington Borough Council as to the desirability of
prohibiting entirely the addition of any mineral matter to rice in this
country.
Inspection of Food [Public Health (London) Act, 1891, Sec. 47].
The Food-Inspectors, J. Osborne, H.E. Child, and W.G.Auger (parttime)
have kept under regular inspection food exposed or deposited for sale in
slaughterhouses, shops (especially butchers', cooked meat and fishmongers'
shops), stalls, and market places.
In addition, the district inspectors assist during the summer (from June to
September, inclusive) with the inspection of market streets. During these
months four district inspectors and one food inspector are on duty for this
purpose on every Saturday night, and two district inspectors and one food
inspector every Sunday morning. They are selected for this duty by rotation.
A list of the principal market streets was included in the Annual Report,
for 1912 (p. 178).
Four seizures of unsound food have been made during 1913. The details of
these are given in the next table.