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There are occasional creches in all divisions where children under five years are looked
after without charge whilst their mothers are attending sessions at the centre or where
they can be looked after for a small charge, abatable in case of necessity, whilst the mothers
visit hospital, attend to domestic duties or shopping etc. Children who need relief from
poor home conditions and the only child needing to mix with other children are also
accepted at the creches. These sessions have increased over recent years; in 1964 there
was an average of 128 sessions a week with average weekly attendance of 1,759.
From the beginning of November 1964 mothers were allowed to leave their children
in occasional creches free of charge upon production of documentary evidence that they
had a hospital appointment on the occasion in question. This was an experiment with the
object of assessing the financial burden that it would impose, so that consideration could
be given to its introduction as a regular feature of the service.

Family planning
In July 1930 the Ministry of Health (Memorandum 153 MCW) authorised local health
authorities to give advice on birth control to married women in attendance at maternity
and child welfare centres where there were medical grounds for considering that further
pregnancy would be detrimental to health. The medical grounds were widened in 1932
to include women suffering from organic diseases such as tuberculosis, heart disease,
diabetes, chronic nephritis, etc., in which child bearing was likely seriously to endanger
life and other forms of sickness, physical or mental, which were detrimental to them as
mothers. What was or was not medically detrimental to health was to be decided by the
professional judgment of the registered medical practitioner in charge of the clinic.
(Circular 1408, 31 May 1934.) These limitations remain operative and the giving of
contraceptive advice in circumstances other than those referred to above is at present
outside the Council's powers as a local health authority and also appears to be beyond
the scope of the National Health Service in general.
To discharge its responsibilities the Council itself provides a few family planning clinics
but over the county as a whole uses the services of the Family Planning Association. A
payment of 17s. 6d. (two guineas for women receiving oral contraceptives, plus the cost of
50