THE MILK SUPPLY.

Gisborne Times, Volume IX, Issue 810, 27 January 1903, Page 3

THE MILK SUPPLY.

(To the Editor Gisborne Times.)

Sir,—l am at length constrained to make the appeal for an inspection of the milk daily vended from door to door in Gisborne, having borne with openly adulterated milk since I have been in Gisborne. The milk supplied to the writer, in common with other residents in the vicinity, is openly “ doctored,” and I have been hoping aghinst hope that sonic one would take the matter up, and demand that the local milk supply be subject to some sort of inspection, and so ensure that householders be supplied with milk —not with what some now get. The Government in their province have appointed inspectors—skilled in the .business—to supervise the milk supplied to factories throughout the colony for the manufacture of produce for the Home market, but little notice is taken of the milk ’delivcicd from door to door, and in my short experience of Gisborne, it seems that milkmen can “ doctor ” their milk with impunity and no notice be taken but it must only be the best and purest that goes toward the manufacturers for export. It is an anomaly that the Borough Council should see does not exist. The facts in a nutshell- arc these : Alter milking in the evening the miLk is set for cream, skimmed in the early morning ; the cipam is sold to the factory intact, and the milk, to which has bee.n added isinglass, or some such sweetening and thickening substance, is delivered by the vendor to his customers, the same morning. Though kept in a too*, room, my milk lias repeatedly turnen within six hours, and even if scalded an hour or two after delivery, it, ft as turned in the saucepan, on the emptying of which I have found a sweet glutinous sediment—the sum that is inserted to supplant the cream sold to the creamery. This is hail enough, but when this concoction is supplied to those rearing babies, the trick becomes ghastly, and I sincerely trust that the Council or district health authorities will move immediately in the matter of the proper inspection of the local milk supply. I am, etc., ..ttt.'i.m.-'pi.’.i?

1 ’ A SUFFERER- j (The Borough has a dairy inspector. who tests samples of the milk supplied to the people, but we understand that test is confined to a lactometer. No doubt if our correspondent makes a specific charge the inspector will investigate to the extent of an analysis, if necessary. It would only be fair to .the other milkmen if a specific charge were made against any alleged offender.—Ed. limes.)