[Report 1937] / Monmouthshire County Council.

  • Monmouthshire County Council
Date:
1937
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1937] / Monmouthshire County Council. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    171/182 (page 155)
    Supervisory Powers of County Councils in Respect of Housing. So much then for the powers of the Local Government Board. The super- visory powers of County Councils were contained in Sections 12 and 13 of the same Act. The former section allowed a Parish Meeting or any four in- habitant householders or the Parish Council to make complaint to the County Council with a view to the transfer of the Rural District Council’s powers to the County Council. Section 13 allowed the County Council to act solely on their own initiative and to apply to the Local Government Board for an Order trans- ferring to the county authority the powers of the Rural Council. It is to be noted that Sections 12 and 13 are confined to default by (a) Rural District Councils, and (b) defaults under Part 111 of the Housing, etc., Act, 1890 which dealt in the main with the provision of working class lodging houses but included the powers to acquire land for the purposes of Part 11 of that Act which related to unhealthy dwelling-houses generally. Before leaving the 1909 Act we may note that Section 51 thereof, in the Town Planning portion of the Act, gave powers to the Local Government Board in case of default of Local Authorities in mak- ing or executing 1 own Planning Schemes. Duties of County M.O.H. To-day. Between 1909 and 1929 there were no changes in law of any major import- ance in regard to supervisory pov\^ers in general. The County M.O.H. (Duties) Order, 1910 was replaced by the Sanitary Officers Orders 1922, and the latter in turn by the Order of 1926. To-day, in 1938, the relevant Order for County M.O.H. is the Sanitary Officers’ Outside London Regulations 1935 and in par- ticular Article 6 thereof. This provides as follows : — “Duties. A medical officer of health of a county shall, in respect of the county for which he is appointed, in addition to any other duties which may be assigned to him by the county council, carry out the following duties:— 1. He shall inform himself as far as practicable respecting all matters affecting or likely to affect the public health in the county and be prepared to advise the county council on any such matter. For this purpose he shall visit the several county districts in the county as occasion may require, giving to the medical officer of health of each county district prior notice of his visit, so far as this may be practicable; 2. He shall perform all the duties imposed on a medical officer of health of a county by statute and by any orders, regulations or directions from time to time made or given by the Minister;