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110
MEAT AND OTHER FOODS.
By-Laws for the Protection of Food.—An advance has been
made in the protection of food since by-laws made by the London
County Council under Section 6 of the London County Council
(General Powers) Act, 1932 (now Section 183 of the Public Health
(London) Act, 1936) for promoting sanitary and cleanly conditions
in the manufacture, preparation, storage, transport, or exposure
for sale of any article intended to be sold for food, came into operation
on 1st January, 1937, and extracts therefrom were circulated
to traders principally affected in the borough.
Although the by-laws are not so comprehensive as might have
been desired or reasonably expected, they are a useful addition in
many respects to powers previously existing, in that the definition
of premises to which the by-laws relate is wide and enables local
authorities to deal with yards, sheds and storages. They also apply
to stalls, vehicles, barrows, trays and other receptacles from which
food is sold, whereas the only stalls that came within the scope of
earlier by-laws were those used by licensed street traders. Food in
the course of transportation is dealt with in the by-laws, control being
given over food on delivery vans, barrows, etc. The responsibility
of occupiers of premises where food is stored or dealt with is defined
as to the repairing, cleansing, lighting and ventilation of the
premises, also the wrapping of food in unsuitable wrappers, as
compared with the less definite requirement of earlier legislation
that "due cleanliness shall be observed." Similar responsibilities
are imposed upon the owners of stalls generally, thus giving a
control, which previously did not exist, over unlicensed street
traders.
Although these by-laws mark another step towards the ideal of
complete protection of the food supply, we are still short of this in
many respects. For instance, despite requirements of the by-laws
that persons exposing food for sale "shall take such steps as may
be reasonably necessary to prevent the risk of contamination of
the food," the sale of unwrapped food from open-fronted shops and
from stalls in the street is still allowed. In my opinion articles of
food such as biscuits, cheese, butter and dates, should not
be sold where, in spite of all attempts at screening, the slightest
breeze will result in some contamination. As another instance, this
Council has frequently requested that the delivery of bread should
be made safe by wrapping previous to delivery and when these
by-laws were in course of preparation this request was again put
forward, but it was decided not to provide for this compulsory
wrapping on the grounds that it might be expected to raise the cost
of bread to the consumer and be a hardship on poor persons. In my
view, such presumptions are not justified as in some cases bread