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Sanitary Services
Sanitary Inspections, 1947:—
Housing inspections and re-inspections 2,790
Registered premises, including factories, workshops,
bakehouses, milk shops and other food shops,
visits and inspections 1,297
Infectious Desease, visits and inspections 1,790
Miscellaneous visits and inspections, including various
complaints, rats and mice infestations, ditches and
ponds, non-notifiable diseases, etc. 8,183
Visits re verminous premises 78
Other Visits 4,062
18,200
Service of Notices:—
Total informal sanitary notices served 949
Total informal dustbin notices served 384
Total informal notices served 1,333
Total informal notices complied with 1,222
Total statutory notices served 119
Total statutory notices complied with 118
The work of the sanitary staff continues to be heavy, and shows
no sign of immediate or even future abatement. As I indicated
earlier in this report, environmental hygiene is all too often set
aside as uninteresting, unproductive and inviting little comment.
That is far from being the case. The work of the sanitary inspectors
is playing and will continue to play a vital part in the future welfare
of the Borough. It is a tragic corollary to our present difficulties
that so much of what should be done cannot even be attempted.
There is, however, much which can and must be tackled if the
position in which we find ourselves to-day is not to deteriorate still
further. Our responsibilities in this field have not been altered by
the passing of the National Health Service Act; we still maintain
our rights, our privileges, and our duties. So far as Southgate is
concerned I am quite sure that the spate of publicity given to the
present Health Service will not allow us to blind ourselves to the
importance of the less spectacular work of environmental hygiene.
Boroughs such as Southgate have won an enviable reputation
for their achievements in the care of the individual; we must now
concentrate our efforts on another field, a field which, although
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