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59
LICENSED COWSHEDS.
The licensed cowsheds are 28 in number (vide Table XII. in
Appendix), viz., 17 in the North, and 11 in the South Sanitary
District. They contain about 500 cows : and have been regularly
inspected thronghout the year. In April, 1877, licenses were
granted for five new cowsheds, and in every case the magistrates
fixed the maximum number of cows to be kept in each, your Yestry's
standard of 800 cubic feet per cow being adopted.
In 1875 I drew attention to ,the necessity of regulating these
establishments (and dairies) by uniform bye-laws: and I pointed
out how this important object might be secured, viz., by getting
the " Government to pass a short Act, conferring on the Metropolitan
Board of Works the same powers in respect of cowsheds
that they already possess in respect of slaughter-houses, unless
the Board should be of opinion that the third section of the
Slaughter Houses (Metropolis) Act, 1874, could be so construed as
to include the business of a dairyman." The Board appear to have
been of that opinion, and that the business might be regulated as
an " offensive trade," and sometime back referred the whole subject
to one of their committees. But any such action on the part of
the Board, which is open to objection, moreover, will probably
prove unnecessary, the Government having shown a willingness to
deal with the subject in a more direct manner.* And although the
Public Health (Metropolis) Bill, 1877 (clause 69), in which
the proposed powers to frame bye laws for this purpose were included,
has been withdrawn for the present session, we may reasonably expect
that legislation will not be long delayed. It cannot be
doubted, as I stated in a recent report, that " the more direct plan
of regulating the business of a dairyman and a cowkeeper by byelaws
authorised to be made, with a view to prevent the spread of
disease, is to be preferred to that of classing so important a business
with ' offensive trades.' The question, moreover, would be but
half settled if the dairies were left out of consideration, which
would necessarily be the case were the machinery provided by the
Slaughter Houses Act put into operation." I am free to confess
the satisfaction with which the promise of a great sanitary reform
to which I have contributed fills me : and I gratefully acknowledge
the support my views have received from your Yestry, and
especially from the Sanitary Committee. Whenever the necessary
powers are conferred on the " Local Authorities " (i.e., Commissioners
of Sewers for the City, and the Board of Works for all
London outside the City limits), I venture to believe those bodies
will find the task of framing bye-laws not a difficult one, the
*The Board, nevertheless, have resolved to deal with the Cowsheds under the
Slaughterhouses Act, that is, provided they can obtain the consent of the Local
Government Board, which is necessary before any trade not mentioned in the Act
can be declared to be "an offensive trade'' within the meaning of the third section.