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67
PREVENTION OF DAMAGE BY PESTS ACT, 1949
This Act is mainly concerned with the destruction of rats and mice
and places a duty upon the occupier of any premises to report to the
Local Authority any infestation by such rodents. Three rodent operatives
are employed full time to deal with such complaints.
During the year 3,450 premises were inspected following complaint
and in 3,276 instances infestation was confirmed and dealt with by the
rodent operatives. In addition, 279 premises were inspected for reasons
other than complaint and of these 271 were found to be infested. Regular
inspections are made of premises where food is prepared or sold and
particular attention is given to methods of prevention of rodent infestation.
Corporation owned premises including sewage works, depots, school
kitchens and serveries etc. are periodically inspected for the presence of
rodents and appropriate action taken if the premises are infested.
Recent evidence indicates that there is no heavy rat infestation of
the Corporation's foul water sewers and, in order to provide a more
economical and effective treatment of such sewers, the practice of "test
baiting" a percentage of manholes has been discontinued. Treatment now
consists of baiting each manhole in an area with an adequate quantity of
poison obviating the need for subsequent visits. A total of 571 manholes
were treated in this way during the year and further treatments are planned
to cover the whole Borough. Treatments have also been carried out in two
areas where sewer infestations were suspected.
FOOD SUPPLY
The supervision and inspection of the food supplies is carried out by
the Public Health Inspectors who are ail qualified in food inspection.

During the year 6,798 inspections and re-inspections were made of
of food businesses (for details see Page 79).