View report page

61
The question is often asked what constitutes a reasonable
and comfortable standard of housing. We are living in a democratic
and progressive age in the midst of intense industrial and
agricultural unrest. The workers, the populace, assert their
claims for better and for decent housing. And all right-thinking
municipal councils agree that the claim is a just one, to be met
by the provision of dwellings which promise health, comfort,
privacy, security, and due consideration for morality. These
matters have been much discussed in municipal and public health
circles and the following suggestions are advanced as tentative
reasonable minimum standards in this connection.
A house or tenement should:
For Security:
Be damp proof, rain proof and wind proof.
Have locks or bolts on every door.
Have facilities for fire escape or (and) fire prevention.
For Privacy and Morality:
Have every bedroom self-contained—that is, no
bedroom is to be approached through another
bedroom.
Have a sufficiency of bedrooms to prevent culpable
sex promiscuity.
Permit of home isolation—that is, the tenement
as a home should be sufficiently secluded from
other tenements to allow the discussion of family
affairs in privacy.
Have sufficient accommodation so that the mother's
confinement should not take place in the living
room required for the use of other members of
the family.
For Health and Comfort:
Have hot water provided for domestic purposes.
Have a scullery with a sink waste.
Have facilities for cooking.
Have a larder.
Have accommodation for illness.