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46
Venereal
Diseases
Act, 1917.
This Act makes it illegal for a person, unless he is a duly qualified medical practitioner, to treat
any person for venereal disease, or prescribe any remedy therefor, or give advice in connection with
the treatment thereof for reward direct or indirect. It further prohibits the publication, unless
authorised, of any notice or advertisement of medicines, medicaments, etc., to be used or applied
externally or internally for the prevention, cure or relief of venereal disease. The penalty for acting in
contravention is on summary conviction a fine not exceeding £100 or six months' imprisonment, and on
indictment, imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years. Prosecutions in the county of London
are undertaken by the Metropolitan Police, and the Council notifies the Commissioner of Police of any
contraventions of the Act coming under its notice.
In connection with the protection of food against destruction by rats, the Food Controller issued,
in August, 1918, under the Destruction of Rats Regulations an Order known as The Rats Order, 1918.
The duty of carrying out the Order was imposed upon the County Councils and the County Boroughs.
This Order was eventually superseded by the Rats and Mice Destruction Act, 1919, which
required the occupants of any land to take all reasonable steps to prevent their land becoming infested
by rats or mice, the authorities for the administration of the Act being in the City of London the Common
Council, in any metropolitan borough the borough council, and in any port sanitary district the port
sanitary authority, the Council being the local authority with respect to the sewers vested in and the
sludge vessels belonging to it.
On the 15th April, 1920, the City Corporation published an interesting report by the City Medical
Officer of Health on the subject of rat repression.
Common and Seamen's Lodging Houses.
The administration of the Common Lodging-houses Acts devolved upon the Council in 1894.
By the passing of the London County Council (General Powers) Act, 1902, the Council obtained powers
to licence common lodging-houses annually. New bylaws for the regulation of such houses came into
force on the 1st October, 1903.
Eats and
Mice Destruction
Act, 1919.
Common
lodging
houses.

Seamen's
lodging
houses.
In 1901 the London County Council made bylaws under section 214 of the Merchant Shipping
Act, 1894, dealing with the inspection, sanitary condition and well ordering of seamen's lodging-houses.
In 1909 the bylaws were amended in certain particulars and a new series came into force on 1st January,
1910. In February, 1910, powers were conferred on the County Council for the licensing of seamen's
lodging-houses, and since that year all such houses have been annually licensed. In June, 1917, the
bylaws were further amended to permit of a wider interpretation of the definition of a " seaman," as
the then existing bylaws were restricted in their application to houses where seamen who had service as
such within the preceding four weeks were lodged; great difficulty was experienced in proving sea
service within this period, and the four-week limit was therefore eliminated in the new bylaws.