§ COLONEL NORTHasked the President of the Local Government Board, If his attention has been called to the Report of Dr. Frankland upon the water supplied by the Southwark and Vauxhall Company—that it is "full of moving organisms, and contains an excessive proportion of organic impurity;" and, if he will take steps to insure a supply of pure water from that Company?
§ MR. SCLATER-BOOTHSir, my attention has been called to the recent Report of Dr. Frankland to which my bon. and gallant Friend refers. But complaints bad previously been made to me by the Wandsworth District Board of Works as to the state of the water supplied by the Southwark and Vauxhall Company, which has for some time been unsatisfactory, and the Water Examiner has, by my directions, been in communication with the company on the subject during the last two months. On the 4th of July last I issued an Order directing that a special inquiry under Section 35 of the Metropolis Water Act, 1871, should be held by Major Bolton, and that inquiry will be held immediately. It is fair to add that the company have been incurring a large expenditure dur- 1321 ing the past year for renewal of their filters at Hampton and Battersea, a work which they admit to have been too long neglected. It remains to be ascertained what further works may be necessary to put this company's supply into a satisfactory state, and what effect the works already executed will have upon it.