UNCOVERED ICE-CREAM

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26113, 28 March 1946, Page 8

UNCOVERED ICE-CREAM

SALE IN THEATRES “JOB FOR HEALTH DEPARTMENT ” (P.A.) CHRISTCHURCH, Mar. 27. “ We are wasting the time of the conference. This is the job of the Health Department,” said Mr H. D. Caro, Mayor of Hamilton, when a remit urging the adoption of a standard by-law prohibiting the hawking of unprotected ice-cream within the auditorium or passageways leading thereto in any theatre came before the Municipal Conference. The remit was lost by a large majority on the voices. ' “We have been represented as scoundrels who are trying to present the consumption of ice-cream in theatres,” said Mr H. Green, Mayor of Petone. “We have been misrepresented and misreported.” Mr Green explained that there was no intention of interfering with the consumption of ice-cream in theatres. The remit aimed to prevent the hawking of unprotected ice-cream. The method of selling cones of ice-cream was unhygienic and dangerous. He had known of cases where boys selling ice-cream had licked the tops of cones in the darkness of the theatre. Trays of ice-cream had been left in aisles where they could be contaminated by the dust stirred up by patrons. He saw no objection to persons buying ice-cream at stalls outside the theatre and talcing it into the theatre or in buying ice-cream in the theatre provided it was adequately protected. A second clause in the remit, aiming to prevent in the same way the leaving of cordial bottles and other obstructions on the floor of the theatre, also received short shrift from the conference. “That is a matter for fire brigades,” said a member.