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108
DAIRIES, COWSHEDS AND MILKSHOPS ORDERS, 1885,
1886 and 1899.
Under these Orders every Local Authority is required to keep a Register
of every purveyor of milk, dairyman, or cowkeeper in its district, to
supervise the milk trade, and to carry out certain general regulations
prescribed in the several Orders.
Under these now in force the Local Authorities are bound to register any
purveyor of milk no matter how unsuitable the premises may be where the
milk is sold.
The London County Council have deposited a General Powers Bill in
which power is sought inter alia :—
" To enable the Sanitary Authorities in London to refuse to register,
" or to remove from the Register, Cowkeepers, Dairymen or Purveyors
" of milk, whose premises are unsuitable for the sale of milk thereon."
I have already reported at length to the Sanitary Committee on the
23rd April, 1907, upon a similar suggestion of the Metropolitan Borough of
Holborn, and expressed therein the opinion that it appeared that there was
nothing to prevent the Local Government Board making Orders prescribing,
as a precautionary measure, that milk should not be sold on unsuitable
premises, and this would, as a consequence, prohibit the registration of such
places. Should this view be correct, any further statutory powers in this
direction are unnecessary.
As the whole question of regulation of food supplies throughout the
country is now engaging the attention of the Local Government Board, it
is very desirable that any additional powers for control of milk supplies
should be placed in the hands of all Local Authorities, and further, that
steps should be taken to ensure that they are strictly enforced everywhere.
Nothing could be more unsatisfactory than the present manner in which
many Authorities neglect their duties in this respect, as will be seen by some
observations in this Report on " Contamination of Milk," pp. 24-30.
This view of the matter is also supported by the last published Annual
Report of the Local Government Board (1906-1907), as will be seen from the
following extract:—
" It is evident that many Local Authorities, especially Rural District
" Councils, carry out the duties imposed upon them by the Dairies
" Orders very imperfectly, and that even in districts where milk is
" produced in large quantities and sent away by rail, insufficient attention
" is paid to the cattle and their surroundings and to the sanitary
" condition of the cowsheds. Only a few Rural District Councils
" appear to attempt any system of Veterinary examination of cattle."