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150
The subject is important, and was deserving of the attention
which your Vestry and the Committee bestowed upon it; for in
the interest of public health, it is eminently desirable that the
Sanitary Authority should undertake the removal of " refuse "
matters; especially such, of animal or vegetable origin, as may
become, if kept too long on the premises, injurious to health ;
the refuse, for example, of the trades of fishmonger, poulterer,
greengrocer, etc. It is the fact, however, that the Sanitary
Authority has no statutory power to remove trade refuse save
by arrangement with the producer. The law on the subject is
contained in the Metropolis Management Act, sec. 128, and reads
as follows:-
"In case any scavenger be required by the owner or occupier
of any house or land to remove the refuse of any
trade, manufacture, or business, or of any building
materials, such owner or occupier shall pay to the
scavenger a reasonable sum for such removal, such sum,
in case of dispute, to be settled by two Justices."
The following (129th) section provides for the settlement by
two Justices of any dispute as to what should be considered
"refuse," in case of difference of opinion between the owner or
occupier of any house and the scavenger—an important point. It
has been held, for instance that ashes from coals burned in the
furnace of a steam engine for sawing wood are " refuse of trade,
manufacture, or business." In another case it was decided that
a Vestry is bound to remove whatever it would be mischievous
and injurious to health to retain on the premises, but not to
remove such refuse as old boots and shoes, old coal scuttles, tin
canisters, etc. The latter decision is a strange one, for it is
hardly likely that a bootmaker would have "old boots and shoes"
on his premises, or an ironmonger "old coal scuttles and tin
canisters," requiring removal as "trade refuse," and such articles
in a private house would not come under the description " refuse of
trade, manufacture, or business," but might rather be regarded as
"rubbish" which the Nuisance Authority is required (by section
125) to collect and remove. In a case tried at a police court the