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and following up of the necessary notices, has swallowed up the
greater portion of our Inspectors' time; but seotion 20 of the
Sanitary Aot, 1866, lays down that "it shall be the duty of the
nuisanoe authority, either by itself or its officers, to make from time
to time inspection of the district, with a viow to asoertain what
nuisances exist calling for abatement, under the powers of the
Nuisance Removal Acts, and to enforce the provisions of the said
Acts, in order to cause the abatement thereof." I must confess
that, so far as Bethnal Green has been concerned, this elause has
been almost a dead letter.
I gather from the figures furnished me by the Inspectors in
Table VI., Annual Reports on Bethnal Green, that the average
number of premises of all kinds yearly inspected has been about
3800. Dividing these between two Inspectors, there would be
1900 each, and reckoning three hundred working days in the year,
each officer would have six or seven primary inspections to make
each day. Now each case requires on an average about three
visits, in addition to the primary inspection, before the work in
those requiring sanitary amendment has been satisfactorily completed.
This tells up to about twenty-four visits per diem; and as
the premises under inspection would probably be scattered over a
wide area, the average time oonsumed in attending to each case
could not be put lower than a quarter of an hour ; the twenty-four
cases would therefore occupy six hours of the Inspector's day.
This, with the extra duties previously mentioned, and the office
work, is about as much as one man can be expected to perform.
Dr. Tidy, in the Islington report previously referred to, considers
that each Inspector should have charge of a district containing in
round numbers 40,000 inhabitants, and about 5000 houses, of which
about 1500 would require either annual or more frequent inspection.
In addition to these there would be the infectious cases, and
complaints, and the periodical trade inspections. He considers
that these altogether would require an average of about twentyseven
or twenty-eight visits per diem, and that this is about what
an Inspector ought to be able to get through.