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171
it may be, to no default of the tenant, but the
companies coolly give us intimation of their proceeding
so that we (acting in the interests of health)
may take legal measures to compel landlords to
have the water supply reinstated, and thus act as
the companies' cat's paw.
House-to-house inspection should, I think, be
carried out habitually, and as is well-known it has
been carried out in the parish of Camberwell from
the moment when the Metropolis Local Management
Act came into operation down to the present time.
But some parishes have not undertaken any such
duty; and so far as I know the Sanitary Acts do not
make it imperative. I presume that the absence
of any such provision in the earlier Acts led to the
introduction into the Amendment Act of 1866 of
Clause 20, which says: "It shall be the duty of the
Nuisance Authority to make from time to time,
either by itself or its officers, inspection of the
district, with a view to ascertain what nuisances exist
calling for abatement under the powers of the
Nuisances Removal Acts, &c." But a clause which
leaves it to a Nuisance Authority to make its own
inspections can hardly be regarded as rendering
systematic house-to-house inspection imperative.
There seems to me, therefore, a reasonable excuse