View report page

103
Housing.
During the year 1932 considerable attention was given by
the Council to the Housing situation in Battersea. In consequence
of the coming into force of the 1930 Housing Act, which inter alia
required a survey of the housing conditions in the Borough, on
the instructions of the Housing Committee a report of this survey
carried out in 1931 by the Medical Officer of Health and on the
housing needs of the Borough was submitted for consideration by
the Committee with regard to the five-yearly programme which is
required by the Act to be submitted to the Ministry of Health.
This report will be found set out in pages 111 to 119.
As a result of the survey, the Committee, so far as the question
of Clearance or Improvement Areas was concerned, decided to
deal in the first instance with Nine Elms (Island Site) and part of
Sheepcote Lane. The first mentioned area was, in part with others,
represented by the Medical Officer of Health in 1920 as an insanitary
area under the provisions of the 1919 Act, but was not then, mainly
owing to the financial stringency, proceeded with. These areas
were viewed by the Committee and negotiations were entered into
with the Ministry of Health and the London County Council with
regard to them, and are still under consideration.
It is to be hoped that the Borough Council's efforts to clear up
some at least of the worst spots in the Borough will be successful.
Where the housing conditions are such as to warrant the use of their
powers under the Housing Acts the clearance or improvement of
unhealthy dwellings is one of the most pressing reforms of the day.
Now that the Government are alive to the vital importance of this
aspect of the housing problem, it should not be impracticable to
proceed gradually with the clearance of the old worn-out and
otherwise unhealthy groups of working-class dwellings which are
incapable of being made fit for habitation.
New Working-Class Dwellings.
Rapid progress was made during the year with the building of
the St. John's College Estate. The first and second blocks,
containing 39 and 50 tenements respectively, were completed during
1932. The remaining blocks containing 183 tenements, were well in
hand at the end of the year, and, it is anticipated, will be complete
by the Autumn of 1933. Of the 89 completed tenements there are
6 of 2 rooms, 55 of 3 rooms, 19 of 4 rooms, 7 of 5 rooms, and 2 of
6 rooms. The rental of these flats varies from 13s. 2d. and 14s.
per week for two-roomed tenements, to 21s. 6d. per week for those
of six rooms, the greater number being three-roomed flats for which
the rent was fixed at from 14s. to 17s. per week.
In addition to the subsidy payable by the Government in
respect of these tenements, the London County Council intimated
that they would be prepared to consider the question of granting