[Report 1953] / Medical Officer of Health, Salisbury & Wilton R.D.C.

  • Salisbury and Wilton (England). Rural District Council.
Date:
1953
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1953] / Medical Officer of Health, Salisbury & Wilton R.D.C. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    13/20 (page 10)
    HOUSING Probably no other single enviromental influence, within the limits of climate and type of country (e.g. agricultural as opposed to metropolitan or industrial areas') is as important to mental and physical health as good housing. In his reports to you in recent years, Dr. Napier had frequently referred to housing needs, including the special needs of old people, and in 1952 he reported on good progress made in re¬ housing people living under bad conditions. During 1953 Mr. Furley’s report indicates much further progress, and the special needs of old people are being kept in mind by the provision of a proportion of single floor houses and very small houses, or flats. Improvements to houses, aided by grants under the Housing Act 1949, were also speeding up, 37 applications for grant aid being received, (as compared with only one in 1952) and twelve approved. Private building, and purchase of existing houses for occupation, aided by loans from the Council, also continued to progress during the year. WATER SUPPLIES Good, piped water supplies now serve eighteen parishes. Most of these eighteen are provided by the Rural District Council directly, the remainder either by a private company or by water brought by the Rural District Council from the Wilton Borough or Salisbury City supplies. These parishes have piped supplies which are limited in availability, and at the end of the year ten parishes had no public piped supplies and were badly in need of such. DRAINAGE AND SEWERAGE Most of the houses in the Rural District that have water-carried drainage have septic tanks or cesspits. These are satisfactory in most parts, but at Fovant, Downton, parts of Redlynch, Berwick St. James and Barford St. Martin, there is urgent need of a sewerage system, with proper sewage disposal plant. Perhaps the most urgent need is at Fovant and Downton, for at Fovant the large water cress beds, which in common with other cress beds in the Rural District, send supplies of delightful and exceedingly healthy green salad food all over England and to South Scotland are situated in the village, close to houses, and if these had water closets draining to septic tanks, the water cress beds would be in constant danger of pollution with the organisms of bowel born disease. Consequently, these houses must wait for the arrival of a sewerage system before they can be relieved of the hardship of dry-conservancy sanitation, the “ night-soil ” being borne away twice weekly. At Downton the risk of flooding, from the Avon, adds to the inconvenience, and potential danger, of cesspits; also of septic tanks that, in times of high ground water level, cannot discharge their effluent properly, so overflow instead.