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In connection with the supervision of drainage works, a total of
2,010 inspections were made during the year. Only four notices were
served under Section 40 of the Public Health (London) Act, 1936, and
in two instances the necessary work was carried out by the Borough
Council, the expenses being recovered from the owners of the property.
It was not found necessary to take legal proceedings for any case
of infringement of the Drainage By-laws.
The work of the inspectorial staff is necessarily reflected in
the work done by the clerical staff and, in addition to the recording
and preparation of the notices mentioned above, 2,531 letters were
sent out by the department concerning insanitary conditions and a
further 933 letters concerned housing and other public health matters.
One of the main difficulties encountered is in dealing reasonably
with those properties which are old and worn out and which are
scheduled, either under a Borough Council or a County Council plan,
for acquisition and demolition during the next few years. It Is both
unreasonable and uneconomic to insist on major repairs and then shortly
afterwards to pull the property down and in fact a great deal of public
money has been wasted in paying for War Damage repairs to property
which has since been demolished.
Whilst repairs were being paid for out of public money by the War
Damage Commission, owners were willing and even anxious to comply with
nuisance notices but now that a high proportion of damage attributable
to enemy action has been repaired and the full cost has to be met by
the owner, if an extensive notice is served the owner frequently
applies to the Court for a closing order on the grounds that the cost
of repairs is unreasonable. The order is usually granted because it
can be shown that the expenditure is quite uneconomic. This practice
is likely to persist whilst the absurd position continues to be that
a new Council flat is worth say £2,000 whereas an old house, giving the
same or greater accommodation but without some of the amenities, even
if put into excellent repair is worth little more than the ground it
is built upon.
The Public Health Department, however, is not concerned with
economics but with maintaining reasonable conditions in which people
can live and, in practice, an endeavour is made to keep the repairs
required by a sanitary notice within such limits that the owner is
not provoked into applying for a closing order, and in spite of what
has been said above many owners have carried out extensive repairs
when it was obviously uneconomic to do so.