Sessional_Paper_1907 — Page 282

Paragraph

177.

Markets.

Cemeteries.

185 (22)

188. The Commissioners are quite unable to understand a system which permits of a Government contract being granted to a firm, merely on the strength of a name and address being given, and without the officials responsible making enquiry as to the identity of the firm with whom it is proposed to sign a contract.

189. In another part of the Report reference is made to the existence of a ciique of contractors who by working with certain of the Sanitary Officials are able to prevent outsiders from undertaking certain classes of contracts and are thus able to dictate their own terms to those compelled to employ them.

190. Under the Standing Orders, the enforcement of the law and Bye-laws with regard to Markets, is the duty of the Colonial Veterinary Surgeon.

He has under him two Inspectors of Markets, one for Hongkong and one for Kowloon.

The former is required to visit daily all markets in Victoria, and those out- side City Boundaries twice a week.

191. They are responsible for seeing that the lessees comply with the Laws and the Regulations, and that the watchmen and scavengers carry out their duties efficiently.

There is also an overseer of markets, who acts under the Colonial Veterinary Surgeon, and Inspector of Markets,'

192. Attention this past year has been called to the dirty state of the Central Market, and the Colonial Veterinary Surgeon admitted that so far as the roof was concerned he was aware of it before he went home on leave, and that it was the duty of the overseer to prevent this.

193. The iron gates were also in a filthy condition and the attention of Dr. PEARSE (who was acting Colonial Veterinary Surgeon) was called to the

matter.

There can be no justification for this state of affairs with the present staff, and reflects great discredit on the Inspector of Markets for allowing it.

194. There were several structural repairs necessary and the Colonial Veterinary Surgeon, before he went home in 1906, reported them to the Director of Public Works, but apparently nothing was done for a long time.

195. Amongst the regulations, lessees are not allowed to wash and cleanse birds, fowls, &c., in their stalls. We find however that this is to a large extent ignored and the Colonial Veterinary Surgeon says it is on account of the killing room not being large enough for the market requirements; tha this has to be allowed to a certain extent, although making the Market insanitary.

196.

We therefore recommend that the killing room be at once enlarged on the lines suggested by the Colonial Veterinary Surgeon in his evidence.

Also that the office of Market Inspector be abolished and the Overseer be made iminediately responsible to Colonial Veterinary Surgeon for carrying out regulations.

197. One of the most unsatisfactory features of the administration is the almost total neglect of the cemetery bye-laws and the cemeteries themselves. Forming an important part of the work of the sanitary officers, as the cemeteries do, they have never received the attention that they should.

198. With the exception of laying out a few terraces and occasionally measuring the new trenches dug by the contractors' men, the officers responsible for the proper enforcement of the law have never for once thought, or even under- stood, that it was, along with their other duties, incumbent on them to see to the carrying out of those bye-laws, and to ensure compliance with the prescribed sizes of the graves.