View report page

64
attention, especially during the last few months, it may not be
uninteresting to briefly note the more important provisions of
existing legislation on the subject.
The Acts may be grouped, for convenience, under two heads,
being commonly known as Torrens's Acts, and Sir Richard Cross's
Acts. The former apply to single tenements or blocks of not more
than ten houses, and are administered by the Vestries and District
Boards of the Metropolis. Sir Richard Cross's Acts are administered
by the Metropolitan Board of Works, and apply to any
houses, courts, or alleys within a certain area, which are unfit for
human habitation, or where diseases indicating a generally low
condition of health among the population have been from time to
time prevalent, and such prevalence may reasonably be attributed to
the closeness, narrowness, and bad arrangement, or the bad condition
of the streets and houses, or groups of houses, within such area, or
to the want of light, air, ventilation,, or proper conveniences, or to
any other sanitary defects, or to one or more of such causes, and
when the existing evils cannot be effectually remedied otherwise
than by an improvement scheme for the rearrangement and
reconstruction of the streets and houses within such area, or of
some of such streets or houses.
Under each of these groups of Acts the Medical Officer of
Health is the originating authority. It is his duty, under Torrens's
Acts, to report to the Vestry any premises (defined as meaning
"any dwelling-house or inhabited building, and the site thereof,
with the yard, garden, outhouses, and appurtenances belonging
thereto, or usually enjoyed therewith") which are in a condition or
state dangerous to health, so as to be unfit for human habitation.
The Vestry are thereupon to refer the report to a surveyor or
engineer for him to report the cause of the evil, and the remedy
thereof, and whether the same can be remedied by structural alterations
and improvements, or otherwise, or whether such premises, or
any and what part thereof, ought to be demolished.
Upon receiving a report from their surveyor or engineer, the
Vestry are to send a copy thereof to the owner of the property, who
may carry out the works suggested therein, or object to the same,