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Housing of the Working CjAsses Bill.
A Bill to provide for the tetter application and enforcement of the
Housing of the Working Classes Acts and to amend the Small Dwellings
Acquisition Act, 1899.
This Bill amends and adds to the powers of Local Government
Board and those of local authorities under the Housing Acts. These
Acts are already very complicated, and, until a consolidating enactment
is passed, an amending Bill, drafted as it must be with reference to the
existing Acts, cannot avoid adding to the complication.
The Bill adopts the principle of the existing Act«, especially those of
the principal Act of 1890, and, apart from some minor alterations, aims
only at the better enforcement of those principles, in the view that,
subject to minor alterations, existing legislation would be sufficient, if
it were properly enforced.
The main alterations proposed with a view to enforcing the Acts
are—
(a) A special department of the Local Government Board is
to be formed which will be employed exclusively in the supervision
of the operations of local authorities under the Housing Acts.
This department will co-ordinate the work of the various officers
of the Board already employed in the work. It will assist local
authorities by advice and information, and will annually make a
special report to Parliament on housing matters.
Where a local authority is culpably neglecting its housing
duties, the Local Government Board will be empowered, after
application to the Court, to deal with slums and to provide housing
accommodation itself in place and at the cost of the local authority.
(b) In some areas the failure to deal with the slum evil and
to carry out housing schemes under Part III. of the principal
Act arises not from any unwillingness on the part of the local
authority, but from financial difficulties. It is therefore proposed
by the Bill to provide parliamentary grants in aid of housing
operations.
Various other alterations of the existing Acts are proposed by the
Bill with a view to lessening the cost of, and facilitating in other ways
the exercise by, local authorities of their housing functions. In particular,
an amendment is proposed of the compensation sections of the Act of
1890 which aims at carrying the principles of these sections—at present
often nugatory—into effect.