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114
Housing.
New Working Class Dwellings.
During the year 18 tenements were erected by the Council
as part of their housing programme.
These were on the site of Nos. 231 to 253 York Road, which had
been acquired by the Council with a view to extension of the
Plough Road Improvement Scheme.
One hundred and sixty-two tenements were erected by the
Peabody Trust on the site of the Royal Masonic School for Girls,
St. Johns Hill, and seven flats were erected by the Battersea
Housing Association at Condell (late Sterndale) Road.
In addition to the foregoing 13 dwellings were erected by
private enterprise.
The Council endeavoured to purchase land in Sheepcote
Lane, the site of the disused Waterloo branch of the West London
Extension Railway, but the railway company were not for the
time being prepared to dispose of the land.
In connection with the Savona Street Clearance Orders made
by the London County Council, a small piece of land, suitable for
the erection of two tenements, which was not required by the
County Council for redevelopment, was offered to this Council.
The offer was accepted.
Overcrowding.
In order to be in a position to supply landlords of property
with the "permitted number" for the dwellings—which information
must be inserted in the rent books—the Council engaged additional
temporary staff to measure rooms and obtain particulars of occupancy.
In all, the rooms of some 18,600 houses were measured,
and in addition particulars of occupancy of nearly 4,000 houses
measured during the preliminary survey in 1935 were reviewed.
In this way it was ascertained that over 900 cases of overcrowd
ing previously recorded had been abated, but over 400 new cases
were registered.
During the year certificates as to "permitted numbers" were
issued in respect of 9,664 houses containing 15,143 dwellings.
The Minister of Health, on 1st January, 1937, issued a circular
on the subject of overcrowding. The following excerpt from this
circular is indicative of the spirit in which the duties imposed upon
the Council are being carried out:—
"The Minister is confident that, when local authorities come to the
discharge of their new duties after the appointed day, he can rely on
them to carry out this difficult task of administration with discretion
and sympathy. The essence of the matter is to realise that most families
are overcrowded through no fault of their own, and the object of the Act
is to help such people and not to injure them."