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In addition to the above, 23 applications were reviewed
following the submission of further medical evidence for
priority; in 11 cases the original recommendation was raised
to a higher category; in 10 instances no change was suggested,
and in the remaining 2 the priority was reduced.
During the year 38 families who had received priority
on medical grounds were rehoused; one within six months
of the recommendation, 3 within nine months and 34 after
nine months.
Closing and Demolition Orders - Rehousing
Where, on representation by the Medical Officer of
Health that a house or part of a building used as a dwelling,
is unfit for human habitation, and is not capable of being
rendered so fit at a reasonable cost, the Council makes a
closing or demolition order, there is no legal obligation
for the local authority to rehouse the occupants. In order,
therefore, to avoid any hardship being imposed, it has
been the practice for some years for every such case to
be considered by a joint sub-committee of the Housing
Management and Public Health Committees to decide whether
there were good grounds for offering alternative housing
accommodation to the displaced persons.
This practice was reviewed in the early àpart of the
year following correspondence in which the Ministry of
Housing and Local Government had stated that it was understood
that the Metropolitan Boroughs' Standing Joint
Committee had accepted, on behalf of the constituent
Councils, amoral obligation to rehouse bona fide occupiers
of properties closed or demolished under Part II of the
Housing Act, 1957. Further information was therefore sought
from the Metropolitan Boroughs Standing Joint Committee
and from the Association of Municipal Corporations. It
would appear that whilst neither of these bodies has ever
formally acknowledged such an obligation on behalf of its
members, it was agreed that the general practice of local
authorities throughout the country is to rehouse tenants
displaced by closing or demolition orders except in such
cases in which it is clear that the tenant in question has
improperly placed himself in the property with the sole
object of being rehoused.
In the circumstances, the Council agreed that there
appeared to be little reason to maintain the joint subcommittee
on Housing Act cases and it was discontinued.