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tion is practicable, cause notice to be served on the owner of such house
requiring him, within such reasonable time as may be specified in the
notice, to provide sufficient and suitable accommodation for the purpose
aforesaid, and any owner failing to comply with such requirements
within the period prescribed in the notice shall be liable on summary
conviction to a penalty not exceeding forty shillings and to a daily
penalty not exceeding twenty shillings.
" Provided that this Section shall not apply to any tenement house
used or occupied as such before the passing of this Act."
Regulation of Cheap Furnished Rooms.—The London County Council
have under consideration the question of the necessity for the exercise
of increased control over a certain type of furnished room, the practice
of letting such rooms for short periods, at a rate not exceeding 10s. a
week, having recently become more general in various parts of the
County of London, that this class of room appears to be occupied by
persons who are, if anything, of a more degraded character than those
frequenting common lodging-houses; that the rent is paid daily and the
appointment of the rooms are mostly of a very scanty and dilapidated
nature, the beds being, in many instances, verminous, and that the ease
with which such rooms can be hired is, moreover, a great incentive to
immorality.
The By-laws which have been made by the councils of the several
metropolitan boroughs under the provisions of Section 94 of the Public
Health (London) Act, 1891, do not confer upon sanitary authorities
adequate power for dealing with rooms of the above description.
Probably considerable difficulty is experienced in putting into operation
the provisions of the General Powers Act, 1904, as to the destruction of
filthy or unwholesome articles, owing to the frequency with which
disputes as to the amount of compensation for articles destroyed arise.
The existence of these circumstances has led the County Council to
consider whether, in the interests of public health, further legislation
should be sought in respect of furnished rooms so let, to ensure that they
should be maintained with due regard to sanitation, and it appears to
them to be most desirable that greater supervision and control than
exists at present should be exercised over this class of house, which is
nearly related in character to the common lodging-house, both in respect
of the class of house and the social condition of the inmates—in fact,
the demand for lodgings of this character exists in the main in localities
where common lodging-houses are situated, the lodging-house and the
furnished rooms not infrequently being owned by the same person.
The County Council are of opinion that more effective control would
be ensured if persons letting such rooms were required to obtain an