46 
THOMPSON YATES LABORATORIES REPORT 
All this, no doubt, is simply a statement of truisms ; but what is it that the medical 
practitioners of the country can do in the way of bringing about an improvement in our system 
of meat inspection, and in the conditions under which animals intended for human food are 
slaughtered ? It is by continually impressing on their friends and patients, influential and 
otherwise, for we all have votes nowadays, the need — the pressing need — in this country for 
improvement in the system. The abolition or private slaughterhouses, where only too often meat 
is prepared and kept under grossly insanitary conditions, and the substituting of public slaughter- 
houses under municipal control, being the only satisfactory means of attaining the desired end. 
{a) The Commission reported on this question as follows : — 
In favour of tliis view I may here quote from [a] tlie Report of the Royal Commission on 
Tuberculosis ; [b) tiie Report of the Public Health Committee of the London County Council, 
July, 1898; (f) the recently published Harben Lectures of the Medical Officer of the Local 
Government Board, Sir Richard Thorne. 
1. We recommend that in all towns and municipal boroughs in England and Wales, and in 
Ireland, powers be conferred on the authorities similar to those conferred on Scottish corporations and 
municipalities by the Burgh Police (Scotland) Act, 1892 — namely : 
{a) When the local authority in any town or urban district in England and Wales and Ireland 
have provided a public slaughterhouse, power be conferred on them to declare that no other place within 
the town or borough shall be used for slaughtering, except that a period of three years be allowed to the 
owners of existing registered private slaughterhouses to apply their premises to other purposes. 
[b) That local authorities be empowered to require all meat slaughtered elsewhere than in a public 
slaughterhouse, and brought into the district for sale, to be taken to a place or places where such meat may 
be inspected ; and that local authorities be empowered to make a charge to cover the reasonable expenses 
attendant on such inspection. 
{c) That when a public slaughterhouse has been established, inspectors shall be engaged to inspect 
all animals immediately after slaughter, and stamp the joints of all carcasses passed as sound. 
2. It appears desirable that in London the provision of public in substitution for private slaughter- 
houses should be considered in respect to the needs of London as a whole, and in determining their 
positions regard must be had for the convenient conveyance of animals by railway from markets beyond 
the limits of London, as well as from the Islington market, to the public slaughterhouses which should be 
provided. At the present time no administrative authority has statutory powers authorizing it to provide 
public slaughterhouses other than for the slaughter of foreign cattle at the port of debarkation. 
3. With regard to slaughterhouses in rural districts the case is not so easy. But the difficulty is 
one that must be faced, otherwise there will be a dangerous tendency to send unwholesome animals to be 
slaughtered and sold in small villages where they will escape inspection. We recommend, therefore, that 
in Great Britain the inspection of meat in rural districts be administered by the county councils. 
4. We recommend that it shall not be lawful to offer for sale the meat of any animal not killed in 
a duly licensed slaughterhouse. 
[b) The Public Health Committee of the London County Council in July, 1898, 
submitted a report to the Council in the following terms ;~- 
{a) That in the opinion of the Council it is desirable that, as a first step towards ensuring the 
proper inspection of meat, private slaughterhouses should cease to exist in London, and that butchers should 
in substitution be afforded such facilities as are necessary for the killing of animals in public slaughterhouses 
to be erected by the Council. 
{b) That a copy of this report and of the Council's resolution thereon be sent to the Local 
Government Board, with an intimation that the Council is prepared to accept such responsibilities as may 
be necessary to give effect, in London, to the recommendations of the Royal Commission on Tuberculosis ; 
