View report page

8
alter as one would wish on account of the high rents
prevailing for working-class houses. The poor must be
housed somewhere and undoubtedly they have to pay away
far too much of their earnings for rent, leaving too little,
even where frugality and temperance prevail, to provide
adequate nourishing food, clothes and the other necessaries
of life. Competent authorities have stated that
20 or 30 per cent, of Urban populations are so poor as
to live below the level of efficient bodily nourishment.
There seems to be no very good reason why healthy,
comfortable well-constructed, though of course unpretentious
houses for this class of people should not be
built by private enterprise and let at a reasonable rental
if the owners would only be content with a reasonable
return for their outlay.
As matters are, many poor people are obliged to
take lodgers or sub-let in order to make up the rent thus
conducing to overcrowding and its many public and
social evils.
I hope the Council will do all in their power to
discourage the building of flats which are conducive
neither to health, sanitation nor proper family life, but
seem on the other hand to have a bad influence in the
causation of infectious sickness. We have no common
lodging houses in this district.
COW SHEDS, DAIRIES AND MILKSHOPS.
There are nine dairies and milkshops and three
sets of cow sheds in the district.
These have been inspected quarterly and found
generally in a satisfactory state. One cowshed was
closed on account of its ruinous and unsanitary condittion.
In this connection I should like to insist on the
need for the most scrupulous cleanliness both of the
persons (especially the udders) of the cows and the hands
of the milkers. Provision should be made for this in
all sheds and insisted upon by the proprietor. In some
milkshops it is the custom to keep milk exposed for sale
without being covered. This is wrong, and the milk
should always be covered with clean muslin or buttercloth.