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accommodation and to make all the necessary foundations for
the provision of staff before this, which is almost a threatened
invasion, actually takes place.
During the year there has been a lot of substantial work done
in committee with reference to the drainage of the town as a whole.
There have been numerous conferences with Ilford and with
Dagenham and with other authorities, and it seems that at last—
what Barking urged so many years ago—we shall have a system
whereby the greater part of the town drains into the Northern
Outfall Works.
The London County Council will no doubt proceed almost
immediately with the erection of houses adjoining those they
have already built within the district of Dagenham, the drainage
from which no doubt will be dealt with by arrangement, together
with that from the houses on the Becontree Estate already
erected.
Considerable work too has been done in committee with
reference to the provision of further and more up-to-date hospital
accommodation for infectious diseases.
I am strongly of opinion that every Local Authority should
be, as far as possible, autonomous, and that each Local Authority
should provide for the isolation of its own infectious diseases
unless the Local Authority is so small as to make it a particular
economic disadvantage to do so.
With Barking a town of about 40,000 population I am of
opinion that we can economically undertake our own obligations.
You have further had under consideration the provision of
more suitable and hygienic vehicles for the collection of refuse,
and this work will be undertaken in the New Year under much
more advantageous circumstances than have obtained hitherto.
Altogether the year has been one of steady progress and I
sincerely trust that in the year that is coming we shall show an