View report page

60
"DAIRIES, COWSHEDS, AND MILK SHOPS ORDER, 1879."
The first Order by Her Majesty's Privy Council under the above
title, and made under the provisions of The Contagious Diseases
(Animals) Act, 1878, was issued in February. It was revoked in
July, and another Order in an improved form issued in its place.
The Order provides for the Registration of Cowkeepers and Dairymen,
and it is now not lawful for any person to carry on the trade of a
cowkeeper, dairyman, or purveyor of milk unless he is registered as
such under the Order, viz., with the "Local Authority." (The Local
Authority under the Act, in London—the city only excepted, is the
Metropolitan Board of Works, hereinafter referred to as the Board.)
It is not lawful, moreover, for a cowkeeper or dairyman to begin to
occupy any "building" for the purpose of the trade without first
giving one month's notice in writing to the Local Authority of his
intention so to do, nor until he first makes provision for the lighting,
ventilation (including air space), cleansing, drainage, and water supply
of the same, to the "reasonable satisfaction" of the Local Authority.
Nor is it lawful for any person following the trade to occupy any
building, whether so occupied at the making of the Order or not, if, and
so long as the lighting, ventilation, &c., are not such as are necessary
or proper (a) for the health, &c., of the cattle (b) for the cleanliness of
milk vessels, and (c)for the protection of the milk against infection and
contamination. Of course the necessity of obtaining a license for premises
intended to be used as a cowshed in the Metropolis is not
superseded by the Act or the Order.
The Order authorises the Board to make regulations for " prescribing
and regulating" the cleansing of dairies, cowsheds, milkstores, milkshops,
and milk vessels; and it directs that the milk of diseased cows
may not be mixed with other milk; nor be sold or used for human
food; nor be sold or used as food for swine or other animals until it
has been boiled.
The Order forbids a cowkeeper, dairyman, &c., to take part, or allow
any person to take part, in carrying on his business while he or any
such person is suffering from a "dangerous infectious" disease, or has
recently been in contact with a person so suffering; and the cowshed,
dairy, &c., may not be. used for any purpose incompatible with the