Page 2 Advertisements Column 3

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18457, 19 January 1922, Page 2

THE DISPOSAL OF REFUSE. TO THE EDITOR. Sie,—lt is suggested that a destructor should bo installed lor the disposal ol house refuse. Before a decision is oome to, your suggestion tnat destructors are back numbers should be fully discussed. Otherwise as has often happened in Dunedin, much money may be expended uselessly. It is clear to me that a destructor is not required so much as the application of a fair amount of care and the exercise of common sense in dealing with this sooalled waste, so that it will lose that character and be made useful. It has been said, “Dirt is only matter out of place.” My first suggestion is that dust tins better than the regulation ones should be ,provided. They should be buoket-shaped —i.o., with sloping aides and have a few small holes in file bottom. This would all assist in the clean emptying of the contents, which is not possible at present. Moreover, the tinsnow in use are too heavy for a woman to carry. Every residence should bo provided by the Corporation with two tins—one for all food refuse, the other for ashes or dry waste. I know from experience that if these are separate receptacles there is no nuisance from the ash tins. It is the mixture of decaying foods that causes bod odours and attracts rats to do their, natural work. The contents of the tins with food refuse would most probably be saleable to those who keep pigs or poultry. This would be use not destruction. The ashes, eta, would be of use to fill in vacant spaces. They would be no cause of disease, would not attract rats, or be a nuisance in anv way. The food tins would be removed by the pig or poultry keepers, the others by Corporation employees, and in neither case should they be emptied into carts in the streets. The drays should bring clean tins when the full ones are taken away. The utilisation of waste metals is beyond us at present but it might be undertaken later on. The scheme would cost money, but nothing compared with the capital cost and running expenses of a destructor. —I am, ete., Anti-Wabtb, January 17.