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This Bill amends and adds to the powers of the 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 Acts, 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 High Court, to deal with insanitary houses 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 insanitary property
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.
As a shortage of working class dwellings sometimes arises from the
closing of existing houses as being insanitary, it is proposed to require
a local authority when enforcing closing orders to consider the need for