View report page

59
expressed the opinion that milk churns should be sealed in transit
and that it should be made compulsory to notify illness of persons
engaged in the dairy trade. It is a remarkable fact that the powers
of the public health authorities to prevent infection by tuberculous
persons engaged in the milk trade remained purely persuasive
until the Public Health (Tuberculosis) Regulations, 1925, which
gave local authorities powers in this direction, were issued by the
Ministry of Health.
Another matter to engage the attention of the Council was the
unsatisfactory conditions prevailing in the street markets. A
census of the stalls taken during December, 1925, showed there
were 64 meat stalls, and approximately 300 other stalls where
food of all kinds was being sold. In addition to these, there were a
number of itinerant vendors selling food in the borough. Food
waiting to be sold was often stored in the gutter under the stall, and
sometimes exposed for sale on the kerb without any protection
from contamination by dogs, dust, dirt and flies.
The only sanitary accommodation available to many of the
stall-holders or assistants who lived a distance from the market
thoroughfares was the nearest public convenience, and there were
no facilities for obtaining clean water for ablution purposes, or for
the washing of fish, or of utensils on ice-cream and refreshment
barrows, stalls, etc. Much of the food sold at the stalls was stored
in disused stables, sheds, etc., or in the vendors' own private
houses and yards.
The attraction of the markets being their reputation for
cheapness, second-rate and doubtful goods often found their way
there, and these in many cases were sorted at the stalls so that
constant supervision was necessary to ensure that articles unfit for
food were not exposed or sold.
Among summonses taken out during 1925 were two for selling
tea unfit for food. This tea contained a large amount of dirt, metal
and iron filings, and was exposed for sale at a low price on a stall
in a market thoroughfare. The vendor was fined £3 and £2 2s.
costs on one summons, and £2 and £1 1s. costs on the other. Apart
from the penalties in this particular case the publicity given to. it
had a very salutary effect and to a large extent apparently stopped
the trade in uncleaned tea sweepings.
About that time sterilised milk in bottles was being sold in
large quantities by a few firms and usually delivered twice weekly,
direct to customers, but a large and increasing trade was done by
small shop-keepers of all kinds who acted as agents and sold the
milk in unopened bottles. There was also a large increase in the
use of bottles for milk delivery which were sometimes filled by the
roundsmen in the streets when delivering, but in the poorer districts