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pleasure of the London County Council, but they cannot prevent, however
much they may regret, such immigration. Dr. Williamson sets down the
moral evils which exist to the account of the Police, the Publicans, and the
Landlords. Over police and publicans the Vestry have no jurisdiction.
Bad landlords, however, are more or less amenable to the legal powers
vested in the Sanitary Authority, and these powers are exercised as completely
as possible, one of the Vestry's Sanitary Inspectors being almost
continuously engaged in the district. Within the last few months, some
of the streets have been inspected from house to house, and not a meeting
of the Sanitary Committee passes without the issue of Notices designed to
secure necessary improvement in the sanitary condition of the houses.
From the statements in the articles under notice, it might be assumed that
the whole neighbourhood is in a state of ruinous decay ; but, as a matter of
fact, nearly all of the streets in the district have been laid out, and the
houses constructed since the passing of the Metropolis Management Act,
in 1855, and they would furnish no ground for complaint were they
occupied by a different class of persons. Were it but possible for the
clergy, and philanthropists, to bring about an improvement in the morals
of the people—and the agencies are numerous, both living, in the shape of
clergymen and district visitors, &c., and material, in the form of churches,
chapels, public elementary schools in abundance and the organizations
referred to by the Rev. Mr. Roberts—the duty of the Vestry as Sanitary
Authority would be much easier than it is at the present time, under the
conditions so graphically desciibed by your Special Commissioner."
The discussion might well have been allowed to close
with the Chairman's letter, but in February some half-a-dozen
persons met together, constituting themselves a " conference
of the leading inhabitants of the district," and passed resolutions
to the following effect:—
(i.) " That this Conference is of opinion that the present insanitary and immoral
condition of the district in North Kensington, comprising St: Katherine's
Road, William Street, Bangor Street, Crescent Street, and part of St.
Clement's Road, demands the serious attention of the London County
Council, the Vestry of Kensington, the licensing justices, and the Kensington
Ratepayers' Association.
(2.) "That the insanitary condition proceeds from the defective state of the street
and house drainage in part of the district, and from the over-crowding of a
large number of the houses; and that the latter cause tends greatly to the
immorality, which is further much increased by the excessive number of
public-houses and beer-houses in the district.