View report page

102
Repair of Unfit Houses.
A good deal of useful work in the repair and re-conditioning
of unfit houses was carried out during the year under the provisions
of the Housing and Public Health Acts, details of which will be
found summarised on pp. 110-11. The work of the Council in
this direction has been fully described in previous Annual Reports,
so that it is unnecessary to say more than that the policy of the
Council in using the powers of Housing Act, 1925, in securing the
re-conditioning of seriously defective house property continues to be
fully justified.
It was not found necessary during the year for the Council to
enter and carry out works of repair in default of compliance by the
owner with notice served under section 3 of the Housing Act, 1925.
Re 18, 19 and 20 Belfour Street.
Battersea Borough Council v. Watts.
Legal proceedings of considerable interest, however, were undertaken by the Council for the recovery of expenses incurred in the
repair of certain houses in North Battersea amounting to £712 4s. 1d.,
together with interest at five per cent. from 30th December, 1925.
The main point taken by the defendant was that he was not
the "Owner" within the meaning of the Act. He contended that
he merely acted as Solicitor for his Client in the administration of
the estate of her late husband and whilst acting in this capacity
he instructed a builder to collect the rents and pay them only to
him. He maintained that he only received the balance of the
rents as costs owing to him as such solicitor.
This case was first heard on 30th March, 1928, before Mr.
J. B. Sandbach, K.C., a Metropolitan Police Magistrate, sitting
at the South Western Police Court, who gave a decision in favour
of the Council. It next came before Mr. Justice Swift and Mr.
Justice Acton on 8th November, 1928, sitting as a Divisional
Court of the King's Bench Division of the High Court on appeal
by way of case stated, and the appeal was dismissed with costs,
but leave was given to appeal to the Court of Appeal. It was heard
in that Court on 31st January and 1st February, 1929, by Lords
Justices Scrutton, Greer and Sankey, and by a majority judgment
a decision was again given in favour of the Council, with costs.
Lord Justice Scrutton's judgment was as follows:—
This is a case of some difficulty and of considerable importance and
I am sorry to say there is a difference of opinion in the Court. The question
arises under the Acts which were passed for, among other purposes, improving
the condition and repair of houses suitable for occupation by
people of the working classes, and in the Act of 1919, which is the beginning
of the series (I do not think the subsequent Acts matter very much) Parliament
provided by section 28 that if a house, otherwise suitable for occupation by persons of the working classes, was not kept in condition reasonably
fit for human habitation the local authority might serve a notice on the
owner of the house requiring him within not less than 21 days to execute