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Under the Infestation Order, 1943, a report has been made to
the Ministry of Food on the degree of infestation throughout the
City. Your Rodent Officer knows from his long experience in the City
What premises .are seriously and constantly infested, and the factors
Which have mitigated against the success of attempts to remedy the
conditions.
these factors include the common difficulties associated with the
storage of foodstuffs and other rat-attractive materials, and the
preparation of food and the disposal of waste in restaurants, cafes,
etc"., particularly when the premises provide abundant rat harbourage,
as is often the case; together with unskilled rat catching and an
absence of co-ordination of effort by the several, sometimes many,
occupiers of individual blocks of buildings.
The Rats & Mice (Destruction) Act, 1919, provides that if an
occupier fails to take all reasonable and practicable steps to
destroy the rats in infested premises, the Local Authority may enter,
carry out the work themselves and recover the cost from the
occupier. The Minstry of Food have encouraged Local Authorities to
place themselves in a position to put is section of the Act into
effect, and have undertaken to re-imburse the net cost of the
aditional staff and equipment necessary to enable them to do so.
the Corporation promptly acted on this suggestion, and in January 1943
appointed two part-time Assistant Officers and trained them in rat
repression. This experiment was so successful that in November 1943
six whole-time Assistant Rodent Officers were appointed. These men
work on the lines recommended after carefully controlled experiments,
by the technical experts: attached to the Directorate of Infestation
Control of the Ministry of Food arid the results obtained have been
very satisfactory. The duties of these Assistant Rodent Officers are
to examine premises to ascertain whether they are infested by rats,
and if so, to what degree, to ascertain what measures of rat repression
are being taken by the occupier and whether they are effective. If
he occupier is taking no measures or they are unskilled and
Eneffective, he is interviewed and usually agrees to the Corporation
Staff carrying out the necessary measures at his expense. In some
Cases a member of the occupier's staff 'is instructed in the measures
Which should be adopted to deal with any re-infestation,
If the occupier is taking effective measures against rats the premises
are simply kept under observation, for which of course no charge is
made.
Renewed efforts are being made to secure co-ordination and
synchronisation of all the rat repression measures throughout blocks
of buildings in defined areas.
he advice and help of the Corporation's staff has been welcomed, but
the destruction of rats and the prevention of re-infestation remain
the responsibility of the occupiers of premises and will not be
taken over by the Corporation.
I have the honour to be, Gentlemen,
Your obedient Servant,
CHAS. F. WHITE.
Medical Officer of Health,
City of London.