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95
Housing.
The housing conditions in Battersea, so far as adequate housing
accommodation is concerned, are still very unsatisfactory, and during
the year 1927 hundreds of cases of congestion and overcrowding
have been brought to the notice of the Housing Committee. For
reasons which have been fully referred to in previous Annual
Reports it has been impossible, except to a very limited extent,
to remedy these insanitary and otherwise undesirable conditions.
Some slight alleviation of this distressing situation has been effected
through the additional dwellings provided by the Borough Council,
and by the quota allocated to Battersea by the London County
Council on their various Housing Estates in cases of special hardship,
&c. Unfortunately, however, there is still a large number of
families in Battersea living under conditions which are, on sanitary
and social grounds, a reproach to civilisation.
New Houses.
It has been pointed out in previous Reports that the Borough
Council have had very limited opportunities of relieving the congestion
and overcrowding resulting from the housing inadequacy
in Battersea, practically the whole of the available area of the
Borough being built upon. Such few opportunities as have arisen
have been seized by them to erect working class dwellings. During
1927, apart from the Plough Road Improvement Scheme, 18
tenements were erected in Latchmere Road, on the site reserved
for the building of the new Maternity and Child Welfare Centre
and Tuberculosis Dispensary, the acquisition of Southlands College
and grounds enabling the Council to utilise these premises for the
proposed buildings. The new tenements were erected by the
Council's Works Department, each containing three rooms and
scullery, and provided with bath, electric light, hot water supply, &c.
These dwellings accommodate 18 families, comprising 37 adults
and 50 children.
The Council applied for, and were successful in obtaining, the
subsidy of £9 per tenement per annum for 40 years.
The Principal's House at Southlands College was utilised for
working-class dwellings.—five tenements—one of three rooms,
three of four rooms, and one of five rooms—having been provided
by the conversion and adaptation of this building.
Fifty-four houses were erected by private enterprise almost
entirely in South Battersea. These additional new houses unfortunately
have little effect upon the inadequacy of the housing