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the order, and may also make an order for the costs incurred up to the time of
hearing."
if the order is not obeyed the Board may with all convenient speed enter upon
the neglected structure or such ground as aforesaid, and execute the order."
For houses which are thus dilapidated so as to be unfit for use or occupation, but
concerning which the officer of health is unable to certify that they are in a
"condition or state dangerous to health," this Act appears to be applicable".
The paving of yards in the rear of houses has been to a certain extent enforced
under the Nuisance Removal Act. The Vestry can further under the Metropolis
Local Management Act of 1855 (section 100) require the owner of any court,
passage, or public place, not being a thoroughfare, to pave and drain, and keep in
good repair such court.
Tho control of tho mode of construction of new houses, and tho requiring of open
space in their rear, is centred in the Metropolitan Board of Works. Under section
202 of the Metropolis Local Management Act, 1855, the Metropolitan Board of
Works are empowered to make byelaws among other subjects for regulating the
dimensions, form and mode of construction, and the keeping, cleansing, and
repairing of the pipes, drains and other means of communicating with sewers, and
the traps and apparatus connected therewith, but such byelaws have not yet been
made. Tho Vestry have no power to make byelaws, but they may under section
75 require, in regard to every new house and every house rebuilt after being pulled
down to the ground floor, that the drain and its connected works shall be constructed
and provided to the satisfaction of the Surveyor of the Vestry. Hitherto in Bethnal
Green the Vestry appear to have limited themselves to giving general directions,
and ventilation of house drains and soil pipes is not insisted on.
The inspection of slaughter-houses and cowsheds is performed by the officers of
the Vestry, who attend the sittings of the justices at which licences are granted.
The power to enforce regulations for these premises under penalty is vested in the
Metropolitan Board of Works, whose officers also inspect cowsheds and slaughterhouses.
Bakehouses are inspected by the medical officer of health in accordance with the
provisions of the Factory and Workshops Act.
The removal of dust is done by contract, the parish being divided into three
districts for this purpose. The removal of dust is weekly, except where pails are in
use, and then a bi-weekly collection is required by the contract. Dust inspectors
are employed to report as to neglect.
Cases of infectious disease are removed to the hospitals of the Metropolitan
Asylums Board by the ambulances of that Board, and disinfection is undertaken by
the Vestry's officers in rooms thus vacated. Articles of clothing, bedding, &c., are
disinfected by tho Vestry's officers in a "Washington Lyons" apparatus, situated
in the Stone Yard.
A public mortuary has also been provided for the use of the parishioners. The
mortuary contains separate accommodation for the bodies of those who have died
from infectious disease as well as of non-infectious cases.
While fully recognising the great improvements effected in the parish in respect
of street paving and sewerage, we are led to the conclusion that the efforts of the
Vestry to maintain houses in proper habitable condition have not sufficed for the
purposes of a parish containing population and houses of the character of Bethnal
Green.