Day 132 - 07 Jun 95 - Page 22
1 Birmingham, how many Environmental Health Officers were
2 employed by Birmingham?
3 A. It was somewhere -- in my day, it was somewhere around
4 60, I would think.
5
6 Q. The one that has now disappeared?
7 A. Rowley Regis, there were four of us.
8
9 Q. Rowley Regis?
10 A. Four. It was a fairly tiny borough of 70,000
11 population, something like that, but, remember, I am going
12 back to the 60s now. I mean, things have probably changed
13 considerably since then. Staffing levels may well have
14 changed considerably since then.
15
16 Q. You are an expert in the field.
17
18 MR. JUSTICE BELL: He puts himself forward as an expert in
19 health and safety. He was a local authority Environmental
20 Health Officer about 30 years ago. It does not seem
21 unreasonable to me for him to say that he does not know
22 what the numbers of Environmental Health Officers would be
23 for particular sizes of local authorities. It, presumably,
24 is up to the local authority how much of their budget they
25 propose to put into environmental health as opposed to
26 community care ---
27 A. Yes.
28
29 Q. -- or education if they are an education authority and so
30 on?
31 A. Indeed, my Lord, and that is going to vary depending on
32 the needs of the individual local authority. They are not
33 all the same.
34
35 Q. Provided they are not in obvious breach of their statutory
36 obligations in that respect?
37 A. That is so.
38
39 Q. I assume that there is no sort of standard there are so
40 many Environmental Health Officers per number of
41 population?
42 A. You assume correctly. There is no such standard these
43 days.
44
45 MR. MORRIS: What was the population of Birmingham around the
46 time that were you employed?
47
48 MR. JUSTICE BELL: When you say Birmingham, did you mean that
49 you worked for Birmingham City Council or just for
50 authorities in Birmingham?
51 A. No, I worked for Birmingham City Council. Warley was
52 outside Birmingham, was an independent borough in its own
53 right.
54
55 MR. MORRIS: So how many premises approximately did those 60
56 Environmental Health Officers in Birmingham have to cover?
57 A. I am sorry ---
58
59 Q. Approximately?
60 A. -- I would not have the figures available. It was a
