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30
ing fly contamination. One can generally indicate the unhygienic
shop by the number of blow flies in the shop during
the summer months. The public are alive to this fact and
will and should patronise only those shops that make protection
of meat one of their principles of sale.
The inspection of all carcases at the time of slaughter,
so necessary if the inspection is to be thorough and competent,
cannot be carried out with the present staff, nor with
the present scattered places and multiple times of slaughtering.
And again, not only are some of the places of
slaughtering lacking in facilities for hygiene, but need constant
supervision by the officers of the Health Department,
if the standard of cleanliness is to be maintained. Centralisation
of slaughtering is very necessary, and would, I am sure,
be welcomed by the majority of the trade. This is no new
policy, but nevertheless a very desirable one from all aspects;
it would not be so necessary were every private slaughterhouse
built on suitably situated premises and on modern
hygienic lines.
The cleanliness in the handling of meat, the protection
of meat in transit, and the protection in the homes, are further
important reforms. These are matters partially covered by
the Meat Regulations, but there are people still prepared to
receive from the dirty hands of the deliverer the joint unwrapped
in paper from a none too clean basket.
Public Health (Meat) Regulations, 1924.
These Regulations came into force on 1st April, 1925,
and are a distinct advance on previous legislature. These
Regulations do not fully cover all our aims in the protection
of meat and foodstuffs.
It was not anticipated, in a district of this character,
with the previous experience of the Staff and knowledge of
the traders, that much in the way of diseased food would be
encountered, or that there would be but little inclination on