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67
The water which the Lea Conservancy Board controls runs from Hertford
to Limehouse. They also took over the Stort navigation in 1912. The
Middlesex County Council's representative is County Alderman Nield, K.C.,
M.P.
The last report of our representative, Mr. Cornish, on the work of this
Board appears to be one for nine months, ended December 31st, 1912.
Pymmes Brook near the Gasworks has been culverted-in by two arches of
14 feet diameter at a cost of about £4,000, most of which sum was found by the
Company.
In July, six Doulton-ware drinking fountains offered us by the Metropolitan
Association were placed in various parts of the district.
MARKET ON THE GREEN.—THE COSTERS.
The stall-holders in Leeds Street, Upper Edmonton, and adjoining streets
give us the same trouble as those on The Green, but to a smaller extent.
At the Farm Committee of 19th July a further complaint was received
from, the County Council with reference to the pollution of Salmons Brook
which is produced by the washings from the costers' stalls, especially the fish
stalls, on the Green. At the Works Committee of 16th March a second
complaint was received.
In April, after the Green was re-surfaced at great expense, the Engineer
circularised the costers warning them against damaging the asphalte.
In August a quantity of unsound plums were seized by the Chief
Inspector on a coster's stall, and later the seller was fined at Tottenham Police
Court.
GIPSIES.
In February, the Council, in common with other districts around London,
passed a resolution drawing the attention of the Home Secretary to the
inadequate power of the law as regards these wanderers. Few of them are the
real Romany, beloved of George Borrow, but merely men with families tramping
the country in vans; they are people whose insanitary habits worry my
inspectors and disgust the ratepayers whose neighbourhood they patronise. The
Government should display no misplaced sentiment in dealing with these
vagrants. The Home Office referred us to section 34 of the County of
Middlesex Act, 1906. In April the County Council were requested to declare
that section in force in Edmonton, and on the 28th May this was done. In
July action was taken in a case under this section. Time will show the
usefulness of this section or otherwise.