Water, Typhoid & Scarlet Fever

The Parish Councils Bill will not come into operation any too soon for the good of Conisborough, where there has been, as long as I have known the village, a system of local government which is little better than a practical joke.

Better evidence of its negative utility could not be desired than a communication I have received from a lady who resides near the Board Schools. She is one of the inhabitants of a row of 16 houses, the whole of which do not possess any water supply. The nearest obtainable water is in Wellgate, where a small colony have to go for their supply and there have to wait their turn—a nice thing if the family happen to be waiting for their tea.

My informant tells me that both typhoid fever and scarlet fever are rampant in the village, and I cannot pretend to be surprised, nor do I wonder that a petition to Mr. Wilson, of Doncaster, asking him to provide a proper supply in this quarter readily received 50 signatures.

I am afraid somebody will write and call me names if I suggest that Conisborough appropriates the pastry for being years behind the times, but I cannot help thinking it, and I will go further and venture to think that if there is a parish where the new Local Government Act was urgently required to wake things up that parish is Conisborough.

Only a plentiful supply of good water is compatible with good health, and one of the first things which the Conisborough Parish Council should do when it comes into existence is to employ the power which the Local Government Act gives it and compel every property owner to provide every inhabited house with an adequate supply of good water.