“This deterioration of race has for some time been recognised by Medical Officers of Health.
“It must be remembered that most of the working people are fixed to the spot, and cannot get a periodical change of climate, or remove from a locality in the event of impending ill-health, or of contagious disease breaking out near them.
“It is of no avail to lament over the laws of absolute necessity, but all parties should combine in a demand for that even-handed justice to the working ranks which, though it may not interfere with a stern destiny which confines them to a life of toil, is bound at least to provide that the theatre of that toil shall be free from the pollutions that endanger the functions of life, and uncontaminated by contagion and death.
“I must say it is a scandal to the present constitution of society that the reverse of this continues from year to year in spite of all suggestions of Medical Officers of Health, and the warnings of experience. In vain does one plague after another ravage the family of industrial orders, and like doomed men they stand amidst the harvest of death looking earnestly, but in vain, to the Legislature for that help which no other power can give. Parents, children, and friends, drop around them, the victims of a poisoned atmosphere; while they hear and feel successive warnings, the irrevocable law of necessity fixes them to the spot, and they cannot flee from the danger.”
The Central Authority, the Metropolitan Board of Works, had, during the decade, been doing much useful work affecting the public health, of London, in addition to its great work, the great system of main drainage.
It had undertaken and had completed several large street improvements by 1870, intended to provide new and improved means of access from one part of the town to another.
“The Board had to supply the deficiencies resulting from centuries of neglect: it had also to keep pace as well as it could with the wants of the ever-increasing population, and the needs of a traffic which grew relatively even more than the population,” and each work contributed to the improvement of the public health, by facilitating and increasing the circulation of air in crowded neighbourhoods.
Another matter, important also in reference to the health of the metropolis, had also occupied their attention, namely, the acquisition or preservation of open spaces in London for public recreation and enjoyment.
A piece of land, of over 100 acres in extent, was acquired and opened to the public as Finsbury Park in 1869; and on the south side of the river, in Rotherhithe, some 63 acres of land were purchased in 1864, and converted into a public park a few years later.