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Health Department,
Tottenham Town Hall,
The Green,
High Road,
Tottenham, N.15.
To: The Worshipful The Mayor, Aldermen and Councillors
of the London Borough of Haringey.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I have the honour to present the report on the health of the Borough of Haringey for the year
ended 31st December 1968. Haringey has seen more progress in the field of mental health during
1968 than in any previous year. Three new types of projects have been opened: an adult training
centre, a hostel for mentally subnormal men and a day centre for the elderly mentally ill. These
centres have been opened quietly and without ceremony, but that does not mean that we are not proud
of the useful work carried out in them.
The Hamilton Hogben Adult Training Centre was named after the late Medical Officer of Health
of Hornsey and Tottenham and here young men and women, most of whom have never been to school
but who instead have attended one or other of the junior training schools in Enfield or Friern Barnet,
are accepted and trained for employment in the busy atmosphere of the Bounds Green Industrial Estate.
They are given an opportunity to acquire industrial skills, and after a period of time some of them
achieve remarkable success and proceed to employment in open industry. Others will remain and
work in the sheltered environment of the adult training centre, but their enthusiasm for the centre and
their interest in work must bring them and their families a new enjoyment in life.
Linden House is a hostel for sixteen men and its presence must assure those parents who are
worried about the future of their mentally subnormal children because in Linden House they can see
that there is a reasonable and very normal alternative to the threat of institutional care. The day
centre for the elderly mentally ill was set up initially as a pilot scheme for people who live near
Woodside House or were able to arrange transport to it, and here a number of older people are cared
for in a group who would otherwise have to stay at home in the care of a younger relative. We are
indebted to the Tottenham British Red Cross which has helped to provide transport for a number of
Tottenham residents to the centre.
During the year it has been very difficult to arrange the admission of a severely subnormal child
to hospital. The two hospitals which serve the area, Harperbury and South Ockendon, have done
their best to cope with increasing waiting lists and hospital authorities are ready to suggest that the
local authority should make hostel provision. We know from our experience that hostel provision is
expensive and one feels that for a child it is a poor alternative to life at home. Home is probably the
most suitable environment for a child not in need of active medical treatment and the child himself
usually prefers to be looked after by his parents. But the burden that falls upon parents whose lot it
is to care for a severely subnormal child is unreasonable and society must share it with them. The
question is should we build hostels where twelve or more children can be cared for by a warden and
his staff at a considerable cost, or would it not be more economical and a more happy solution for
both parent and child if we could give the parent some reasonable financial assistance, to help them
obtain additional nursing and domestic and baby sitting care of their own choice and at their own
discretion? Such arrangements would probably help to alleviate the almost unbearable strains of
these families whose children remain so long on hospital waiting lists.
The highlight in environmental health is the achievement of the objective of the ten-year
programme of smoke control so that the whole of the Borough is now a controlled area. It required a
considerable amount of education and persuasion, disturbance and money to pay for the numerous
radiators, fireplaces, gas pokers and other installations that were needed, but such was the
enthusiasm for clean air and better methods of heating, that more than two-thirds of the householders
went ahead and installed their own appliances and never claimed any financial support from their
fellow-ratepayers; what might have cost a million in actual fact cost less than a third of that amount.
The pea-soup fogs of our childhood days are now part of London's history.