93. Mr. INSKIPasked the Food Controller what is the number of the staff occupying No. 8, Woodland Road, Bristol, and what are the duties they are now per forming; what other premises in Bristol are occupied by the local food control committee; whether the functions of this committee will continue beyond 30th June; and whether, in view of the great scarcity of houses in Bristol, he will arrange that the above-mentioned and other residential houses occupied by the local food control authorities shall be vacated by Midsummer Day?
§ Mr. McCURDYThe premises to which the hon. Member refers are occupied by the Divisional Food Commissioner of the Ministry of Food for the division comprising the counties of Gloucester, Somerset, Devon, Dorset, and Cornwall. The staff employed in these premises is at present forty-five in number. The Divisional Commissioner is charged with the administration, under the Ministry of Food, of all measures of food control within his division. The Bristol Food Control Committee occupies No. 8, Victoria Street, and No. 8, Bridge Street, neither of these being residential premises. The former premises cannot be dispensed with at the present time, but I am informed that the Committee have arrived at an understanding with the land lord that they will be vacated at the earliest possible date. The tenancy of No. 8, Bridge Street, terminates on 29th September, but the landlord has been in formed that the premises will be vacated as soon as they are required. The work both of the Divisional Food Commissioner and of the Food Control Committee will have decreased considerably by the end of June, and it is probable that it will terminate, so far as can at present be foreseen, about the end of September.