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137
With regard to milk and milk products, the Departmental Committee made
the following recommendations:—
"(b.) That the use of any preservative or colouring matter whatever in milk
"offered for sale in the United Kingdom be constituted an offence under the Sale of
"Food and Drugs Acts.
"(c.) That the only preservative which it shall be lawful to use in cream be boric
"acid or mixtures of boric acid and borax, and in amount not exceeding 0.25 per
"cent. expressed as boric acid. The amount of such preservative to be notified by
"a label upon the vessel.
"(d.) That the only preservative permitted to be used in butter and margarine
"be boric acid or mixtures of boric acid and borax, to be used in proportions not
"exceeding 0.5 per cent. expressed as boric acid.
The Local Government Board suggested in their circular letter of 11th July,
1906, that Public Analysts should be requested—
"(a) To record in their quarterly reports how many milk samples have been
"examined during the quarter, with a view to ascertaining the presence of substances
"commonly in use as preservatives, and with what result; and to draw the attention
"of the Council to instances where the use of preservatives in milk, other than the
"boron preservatives and formalin, have come under notice.
"(b) To report, on completion of analysis, the facts as to samples of milk which
"have been found to contain any added preservative."
With a view of ascertaining to what extent preservatives were used in
milk and cream sold in the City, the Public Analyst was asked to report as
to their presence or otherwise in 100 samples. Of these, 94 were milk and
6 cream.
Only 7 of the milks, or 7.4 per cent., were found to contain preservatives,
a small quantity of boracic acid being the agent employed in each instance.
Boracic acid was present in all the samples of cream, but in only one case
was the amount found to be in excess of the limit—0.25 per cent.—suggested
by the Departmental Committee on the use of Preservatives in Cream.
This instruction of the Local Government Board as to prohibiting the use
of preservatives in milk appears, however commendable in other respects, to be
ultra vires. The recommendations of the Departmental Committee on
Preservatives have no legal value, and the only authority at the present time
having statutory power to make regulations with regard to milk products is
the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries, and on this point I reported to the
Sanitary Committee in September, 1904, to the following effect:—
"The Local Government Board have no power to make regulations of this nature,
"this being a matter that the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries alone has power