Enclosure No. 2.
17/
With reference to the question of compulsory
pasteurization of milk:-
1. Has Government's attention been drawn to a debate which
took place in the House of Lords on April 27th, as reported by 'The Times' of April 28th, 1937, on the Poole Corporation Bill, which originally contained a clause relating to pasteurization of milk, and in particular to the following observations:-
(Lord Cranworth) "It was admitted
that the real
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reason for including this clause in the Bill was the recent
outbreak of typhoid fever at Bournemouth. This appeared to be panic legislation
There might be a case for
prohibiting the sale of unclean milk unless it had been
pasteurized, but there was an equally good case for saying
that if clean milk was available it should not be
pasteurized at all. It was nowadays easier to get
pasteurized milk than non-pasteurized milk."
Viscount Hallifax) "He agreed that the health of the
people must be the first and the last consideration and
that the question of vested interests did not arise. But
in matters of this sort they must be none the less concerned
to see that measures designed to promote health were wisely devised. In 1934 the Economic Advisory Council's Committee
on Cattle Diseases, presided over by Sir Frederick Hopkins, referred to this subject of pasteurization in its report
The Government had reviewed the whole matter, and
he was authorized to announce that it was their intention
to bring forward long-term legislation dealing with milk
policy generally in the near future. In this connection the Government would examine the question of pasteurization in the light of all the evidence that was available with a view to deciding whether or not it would be in the public
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