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The large property owning organisations, British Railways, the Greater London Council,
the London Borough of Camden and the St. Pancras Housing Society have all been in the forefront
with schemes for the conversion of their properties and the St. Pancras Housing Society went
ahead with a particularly ambitious scheme for the installation of modern up-to-date solid fuel
room-heaters and back boilers in all their flats which required conversion.
In the northern part of the Borough the Order covers an area of 195 acres containing 1,657
separate dwellings. It produced perhaps the sharpest possible contrast in types of residence to be
dealt with, from blocks of flats to the elegant town houses of Church Row and the spacious
development of Redington Road.
In the case of conversions in domestic premises, following the lines of the Ministry
circular No. 69/63, emphasis was placed on the installation of solid fuel appliances and in particular
openable or closed stoves, inset or freestanding, capable of burning the entire range of fuels
available. In addition greater grant facilities were made available for gas fires and also electric
off-peak storage heaters. To publicise the benefits of the Clean Air Act, 1956 and to explain to
householders how to obtain grant assistance, mobile exhibitions were staged in co-operation with
the Solid Smokeless Fuel Federation in March and September and a static exhibition held in the
North Thames Gas Showrooms in April for a fortnight.
The trend of conversions has been in the order of 55 per cent, solid smokeless fuel,
40 per cent, gas and 5 per cent, electricity.
The parts of the Borough which at the beginning of the year were already within Smoke
Control Areas and the parts which were not covered by confirmed Orders at the end of the year,
are also indicated on the map in the Appendix.
OFFICES, SHOPS AND RAILWAY PREMISES
ACT, 1963
The Offices, Shops and Railway Premises Act, 1963, which came into force on 1 August
1964, requires registration of the premises, sets out minimum standards on overcrowding, temperature,
sanitary and washing facilities, first-aid requirements etc., and requires that certain information
should be made available to the persons employed in the premises.
The local authority is in general required to enforce the legal standards in shops and
offices, whilst the Factory Inspector of the Ministry of Labour is responsible for enforcement in
local authority premises and in factories.
In many instances factories and offices are combined in one building, and to prevent
duplication in these cases an agreement is reached with the Factory Inspector that one or the
other shall be responsible for enforcement, the agreement being based generally on the major use
of the premises.
Man. of there cases present considerable difficulty and agreements were still being
negotiated with the Factory Inspector at the end of the year.
It was required that all premises covered by the definitions in the Act should be registered
between 1 May and 31 July, 1964, but. although there was considerable publicity on a national scale,
it soon became obvious that registrations were far from complete; indeed it was estimated that
on 1 August 1964, registrations did not reach 60 per cent. of the total premises.
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