| AdminHistory | Prior to 1848, the only provisions for public health in Birmingham were either through the workhouse infirmary, voluntary founded establishments such as the General Hospital (opened in 1779) and the Queen’s Hospital (opened in 1841), or cleaning and drainage work undertaken by the Street Commissioners. Birmingham did have a Medical School, which opened in 1828, renamed the Birmingham Royal School of Medicine in 1836, then the Queen’s College in 1843. All over the country poor sanitation and outbreaks of cholera and other diseases finally prompted a series of national reports, culminating in the first Public Health Act in 1848. The Act set up Boards of Health, but after the damning report of the Inspector of the General Board of Health in 1849, further work was undertaken by the Commissioners, but most of this was absorbed into the Council after the Improvement Act, 1851. The Council set about continuing the Commissioners’ scheme to build sewers, most of which were completed by 1858 (see BCC/1/AO Public Works Committee minutes, BCC/1/AS Sewage Committee minutes, BCC/1/AV Sewage Inquiry Committee minutes, and BCC/1/AW Sewage Committee minutes).
The Council set up the Borough Inspection Committee prior to May 1856, and comprised eight members. Its function was not one of pure public health, but to administer the terms of the Birmingham Improvement Act of 1851. The committee were supported by an Inspector of Nuisances, who reported to the committee, arranged repairs, arranged removal and cleansing, or referred to the Borough Justices any breaches of the Act considered to be public nuisances.
Public nuisances could be, and many were, health issues, or what would be considered today as health and safety issues, such as blocked drains, night soil and manure, smoke emissions from chimneys, the keeping of animals, licensing slaughterhouses, manufacturing waste (or spillages, such as acid in one case). However, other breaches or nuisances could be to do with damaging roads or paving, the provision of public urinals, fountains and Hackney Carriage stands. The committee also dealt with staffing and financial issues.
In 1860 the committee took on responsibility for the adulteration to food and drink, and appointed an analyst, after the Act of the same year. Other Acts followed that increased the committee and the Inspectors workload, such as the Bakehouse Regulation Act, that required visiting all bakehouses over ventilation. The licensing of gunpowder and petrol were two other functions it took on. In November, 1872, as a result of the Public Health Act of that year, the name of the committee changed to the Sanitary Committee.
In November 1872, the Borough Inspection Committee changed its name to the Sanitary Committee after the Borough had been made an Urban Sanitary District under the new Public Health Act of 1872. The committee retained its structure and all its previous functions; however, now they were required to appoint the first Medical Officer of Health for Birmingham. His duties included investigating and reporting all 'influences…threatening to affect injuriously the public health within the Borough', causes of disease and their removal or mitigation, the framing of bye-laws to aid sanitation, liaise with the Inspector of Nuisances and Food Analyst for public health purposes and investigate trade processes detrimental to health.
By 1874 the committee was looking to build a hospital for the reception of persons suffering from infectious disease, and the smallpox wing of the workhouse in Winson Green was taken over from the Board of Guardians to become the Borough Hospital. The committee also took on the responsibility for enforcing regulations for common lodging houses. By 1875, the committee employed a Chief Inspector, nine Inspectors of Nuisance and Lodging Houses, one Smoke Inspector and one Inspector of small-pox, which was significantly less than other Authorities. As the standard of sanitation declined in the City, the committee appointed more inspectors, as well as Disinfectors and Whitewashers, and set up disinfection stations, the first being at Bacchus Lane in Handsworth.
The Public Health Act, 1875 was a comprehensive and all-encompassing piece of legislation that brought all public health issues under one department, the Local Government Board, which possessed its own status, with its own Minister and all the apparatus of a fully formed Government Department. Matters such as sewerage and drainage, nuisances, offensive trades, unsound food, infectious diseases, hospitals, prevention of epidemics, highways, markets and slaughterhouses were all now dealt with by one body. But the most important factor was that each area had to appoint a Medical Officer of Health, who was to be adviser and executive officer of his local authority. In response to this legislation, in April 1876, the Sanitary Committee changed its name to the Health Committee. The committee managed to offload to the Watch Committee some of the licensing functions that it had previously done for Hackney Carriages, including gunpowder, fireworks and petroleum. The committee had also offloaded slaughterhouse work and the sale of corrupted foodstuffs to the Market and Fairs Committee. The committee of course dealt with all matters of staffing, including pay, and had by 1878 increased the size of the Health Department to nearly double that of 1875.
One of its first tasks was to erect a number of mortuary buildings, the first being behind the gaol at Moor Street. The committee also established a Night Soil and Interception Department. This department tackled the clearance of cesspits and the transportation to the Shadwell and Montague Street, and later Rotton Park Wharves, for the journey to the Saltley Sewage Works, to be processed or sold as fertilizer to farmers. They also arranged the collection of refuse and other street nuisances, such as dead animals and its transportation to tips, such as those at Tysley, Waterloo Street and Stirchley Street, or to furnaces for disposal (also called destructor plants and incandescent chimneys), such as those at Holliday Street, Montague Street and Rotton Park. Further, under the 1875 Act, and the Artisan and Dwellings Act, 1875, the committee now had responsibilities for dangerous and unfit housing and under the Canal Boat Act, 1877, for registering canal boats.
After constructing the mortuaries, in 1879, the responsibility for them was passed to the Watch Committee, but the committee gained the function of registering and inspecting dairies and milk shops, under the Act of 1879 (1885 and 1886). By 1880, the general heath of the borough had improved little, and in 1881 the first Veterinary Inspector was appointed and the committee took on responsibility for the new Stable Department, which catered for the Corporation horses (also BCC/1/AG General Purposes Committee minutes). The Borough Fever Hospital, also called the City Hospital, at Winson Green, was extended several times by 1883, as the town faced several epidemics from smallpox, scarlet fever and other diseases, like measles and whooping cough were ever present.
In October 1890, the committee was charged by a Councillor for improper conduct, and a public enquiry was convened regarding allegations against the committee for what amounted to fraud in the Interception Department, although the committee was acquitted. This was followed by an increased workload, under a series of legislation, the Housing of the Working Classes Acts 1890 - 1900, when the first Housing Committee was formed to take over responsibility (see BCC/1/BF). After outbreaks of scarlet fever, influenza and smallpox in 1893, an isolation hospital at Yardley Green Road, Little Bromwich was opened the following year.
In 1897, the committee sent a party to the Pasteur Institute to assist a Birmingham man with suspected rabies and a vaccination programme was undertaken due to a diphtheria epidemic (mainly under Guardians of the Poor). In March 1899 the first female health visitors were appointed to visit new mothers and families with children. In November 1901, the Health Committee passed on much of its housing work to the new Housing Committee (see BCC/1/BF), though the department itself was still involved, simply reporting to a different committee.
In 1907, the Council purchased the Salterley Grange estate, near Cheltenham, to be converted into a sanatorium for consumptive patients; it was opened the following year. In 1907 a further Public Health Act was passed, further tightening control by the Committee on unregistered lodging house keepers, patrons of unhealthy houses or workplaces and on the public over infectious diseases. In October 1910, a sanatorium was opened in Yardley Road. In November 1911, the Housing Committee and the Health Committee were merged to form the Public Health and Housing Committee (see BCC/1/BM) and the refuse and salvage aspect was transferred to the new Lighting, Stables and Refuse Committee (see BCC/1/BP). |