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82
It has become abundantly clear that, without purchasing a
considerable number of properties, it will be impossible to comply
with the provisions of the 1955 Act, which lays down that requisitioning
shall come to an end on 31st March, 1960. Having regard to
this, owners of requisitioned properties were circularised to see how
many would be willing to sell their properties to the Council. There
was quite a good response from owners, but little headway was
made in the actual purchase of properti s due in part to shortage of
technical staff in the Borough Engineer's Department required for
preliminary surveys and to the somewhat lengthy administrative
procedures which have to be gone through in dealing with the
Ministry of Housing and Local Government on the question of
Exchequer grants.
The general shortage of Council properties to let prompted the
Housing Committee to set up a Sub-Committee to look into the
question of under-occupation. Briefly, the recommendations of
this Sub-Committee, which were adopted by the Housing Committee,
provided for the continuation of the existing policy of voluntary
transfers from under-occupied houses and flats into smaller dwellings,
to be encouraged by the Council paying the removal expenses of
tenants transferring to smaller premises, thus releasing larger
accommodation to be put to better use. To facilitate such moves
and mutual exchanges, an earlier requirement that no tenant might
transfer or exchange accommodation within two years of taking
up his tenancy was rescinded and it was further decided to authorise
the admission of related lodgers in certain circumstances so as to
make the best use of available accommodation.
The execution of the policy of encouraging transfer to smaller
dwellings was facilitated by the introduction of a new rent structure
in April 1957 whereby rents are now linked with the rateable values
of properties. Hitherto it had often transpired that the rents of
small post-war flats were more than pre-war houses and tenants were
understandably reluctant to move from larger premises to the
smaller type if higher rents were involved. With the new rent
structure however, this impediment has been removed.
To sum up, it can be said that 1957 was a lean year from the
point of view of accommodation and the emphasis has been on making
the best use of the diminished resources at the disposal of the
Housing Committee. It is anticipated that 1958 will show considerable
improvement in the number of dwellings available from all
sources for general letting."