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V
Annual Report on the Health and Sanitary
Condition of the City of Westminster.
1 9 3 O .
Mr. Mayor, My Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen,
I have the honour to present my Annual Report for the year 1930.
The report is prepared in accordance with the requirements of Circular
1119 from the Ministry of Health. The Circular required that this
report should be of the nature of a survey report on simpler lines than
that of the survey report of 1925, but paying special regard to housing
conditions in the area in view of the new provisions contained in the
Housing Act of 1930.
The opportunity therefore has been taken of embodying a general
review of housing conditions throughout the City. In the housing section,
pages 92 to 123, the characteristics of each Ward are described, the
types of working-class dwellings are detailed together with any defects
or deficiencies which call for comment. The presence of overcrowding,
illegal occupation of underground rooms and other insanitary conditions
are discussed and recorded. Where it seems practicable, suggestions
are offered for remedying conditions. The measures which the City
Council has taken during the past five years for improving the housing
of the working classes, including, as they do, the completion of more
than 200 dwellings as additional accommodation (in contrast to replacement
or rehousing operations), are an achievement worthy of remark
in so central an area.
New homes have been provided for 210 families on the Ebury Bridge
Scheme ; four blocks are already occupied, while the remainder containing
130 flats are almost ready. On the Grosvenor Housing Scheme
some 154 families from the Millbank area will have been rehoused by
July, 1931, at the same rents but in vastly superior conditions to those
of their old homes. When this Scheme is finished in 1934, G04 families
will have been accommodated. The Council's contribution to housing
in the City since the war closely approximates to 1,000 new dwellings
built or to be built. Photographs shewing the new flats and the insanitary
properties which they are replacing are shewn on pages 107 to 112.