§ Colonel LOCKWOOD (Essex, Epping)To ask the President of the Local Government Board whether he has received a petition from the ratepayers of Seven Kings, complaining that the whole of the house refuse for the Urban District of Ilford is being shot in a gravel pit in 1142 close proximity to one of the council schools where 1,300 children attend, and within a few hundred yards of dwelling-houses; and what steps he is taking to compel the Ilford Council to abate this nuisance, which is a menace to health.
(Answered by Mr. John Burns.) I have received the petition referred to, and have been in communication on the subject with the urban district council, who state that no nuisance whatever exists. They referred the matter to their Public Health. Committee, by whose direction I am informed that " the refuse is tipped into a disused gravel pit from which the gravel, etc., has been excavated to the distance of several feet, and it is then levelled and covered over with a good sprinkling of gas lime on which is placed a good layer of loam or earth. The refuse is covered up daily. "I am also informed that the school mentioned in the Question is 500 yards away. I have been furnished with a report of the medical officer of health of the district, in which he states as follows: —" I have paid visits to the shoot several times a week, at all sorts of times, but on no single occasion did I find any condition of things likely to produce a nuisance or to be detrimental to the health of anybody residing in the neighbourhood, and I am of opinion that while it is treated in the same way as it is at present there is no likelihood of anything detrimental to the health of the neighbourhood occurring." I may add that I understand that the disposal of the refuse at the gravel pit is only a temporary measure until the council decide upon the course they will adopt for permanently dealing with it.