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Housing of the Working Classes—Statistics. 155
Housing Statistics—Memorandum by the Housing Manager (Mr. S. G. Burgess).
The new buildings completed and opened between 1st April, 1914, and 31st March, 1915, comprise
76 cottages, providing accommodation for 580 persons. Up to 31st March, 1915, a total of
6,420 tenements in block dwellings, and 3,402 cottages, or a total of 9,822 lettings, containing 28,252
rooms; and 1,874 cubicles in lodging houses, affording accommodation altogether for 57,942 persons,
had been provided and opened by the Council. The gross rent receivable for the year 1913.14 was
£226,294 11s. 3d., and for the year 1914.15, £228,369 8s. 4d., being an increase of £2,074 17s. 1d.
The financial result of the year's working of all dwellings in occupation, after providing for
interest and sinking fund charges on the capital expended, is a surplus of £12,625 0s. 10d., which, after
adding interest on cash balances (£717 19s. 5d.), and also the difference between totals of debt
charges on cash and stock basis (£4,007 15s. 10d.), and deducting the cost of war allowances
to staff and employees on active service, gives a total net surplus of £16,488 17s. 7d., or 7.10
per cent. of £232,157 9s. 5d., the gross rental for the year. The interest and sinking fund
charges amount to 49.22 per cent. of the gross rental. The sinking fund, which will redeem the capital
expended on land and buildings within a period of 60 years, has been increased during the year by
£27,174 18s. 4d., and the total sum now set aside in this fund in respect of dwellings in occupation
amounts to £260,377 11s. 5d. The expenditure for the management of the estates, including repairs,
rates and taxes, water, lighting, etc., amounts to 40.33 per cent. of the gross rental. During the year
the sum of £23,436 has been transferred to the repairs and renewals account, the unspent accumulations
on which, with the interest earned during the year (£1,990 19s. 3d.), now amount to £67,027 17s. 3d. The
total addition to the fund was 10.95 per cent. of the gross rental.
The loss of rent by empties (including the amounts lost at the opening of the new buildings—
76 lettings) is equivalent to 2.59 per cent. of the gross rental.
During the year 2,144 tenants left the dwellings. This is equivalent to 22 per cent. of the
total number of tenements, as compared with 22 per cent. in 1913.14. Of the 2,144 tenants who
removed, 294 tenants, or 13.71 per cent. of the number, were given notice to quit by the Council,
either for non.payment of rent, disorderly conduct, or some other cause. The remaining 1,850
tenants, or 86.29 per cent., gave notice to the Council and left to suit their own convenience.
A total of 6,097 applications for accommodation on the Council's estates (excluding lodging
houses) were dealt with, and 702 transfers were effected. These transfers are sometimes to a different
estate, owing to the tenant having changed his place of work, and sometimes to a larger or smaller
tenement on the same estate, owing to the increase or decrease of the tenant's family. Of the 6,097
applications received, 2,199 or 36.06 per cent. were suited with accommodation.
A number of tenants who removed from the dwellings and shops were in arrear with their rent,
and left without paying the amounts owing. Every effort has been made to recover these arrears on
vacation, but the amount of £385 8s. 7d. or .16 per cent. (3s. 2¼d. in each £100) of the gross rental has
been included in the accounts as irrecoverable.
During the year the Council did not rehouse any persons who had been displaced by improvement,
clearance or education schemes. The total number of displaced persons rehoused to 31st March,
1915, is 1,756.
The usual annual enumeration of tenants of the Council's dwellings was taken in March, 1915,
and showed that the rooms (excluding lodging houses), available for letting, were actually occupied
by 35,570 persons, or an average of 1.27 persons per room. The birth rate for the year amounted to
25.22 per 1,000, and the death rate (exclusive of the three men's lodging houses) to 9.53 per 1,000.
As in previous years, a careful examination of the enumeration returns was made with a view to the
detection of cases of overcrowding. The maximum number of persons to be allowed in any
tenement in the Council's dwellings has been fixed at two persons per room, children up to the
age of 5 being for this purpose reckoned as nil, and children between the ages of 5 and 10 as half an
adult. This year the number of cases not complying with this standard was 16 or .16 per cent. of the
total number of occupied tenements. The overcrowding is usually found to be due to one or more
children in the tenement having reached the age of 5 or 10 years, and so being counted in accordance
with the Council's scale. This overcrowding is usually remedied by the removal of the family to a
larger tenement in the dwellings.
A sum of £22,400 7s. 1d. (9.64 per cent. of the gross rental) has been spent in repairs to the
buildings during the year. These repairs include external painting at 27 blocks of tenements and
985 cottages, whitening the soffits and cleaning or minting walls of 137 staircases, comb graining and
varnishing the woodwork of 216 tenements and cottages, and cleansing repairs at 6,600 tenements and
cottages. The ground and basement floors of Bruce House, have also been painted internally as well
as the framed partitions to the cubicles on the dormitory floors. The whole of these repairs have been
executed by direct labour employed in the housing department.
During the year 21 small fires occurred in the dwellings. The damage was in every case slight
and the total cost of reinstatement, amounting to £17 6s. 6d., was covered by the Council's insurance
fund.
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