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41
local authority should have the power to compel the sale of such
property at the rateable value of the land and the materials. What
is desirable is a reform in the existing law which will make it
unprofitable to own hopelessly insanitary property. At present the
cost incurred for "compensation" and construction leads to the
substitution of dwellings which can only be let at a rental which is
too high for the bulk of those evicted, who therefore increase the
overcrowding in the adjacent slums.
Slums encourage drunkenness, and, on the other hand, a
drunken, thriftless class will produce slums; and if drunkenness,
vagrancy, and culpable pauperism could be effectually diminished,
one result would be a largely-increased proportion of persons able
to pay rent for improved and suitable dwellings.
It will be said that with lowered rents many will still continue
to live huddled together and in filth, if they can thereby save something
for dissipation. That may be conceded, but when the Sanitary
Authority is in the position of being able to say that sufficient
accommodation is procurable at such a reasonable rent that the
people can live wholesomely, then it will be for the Sanitary Authority
to see that they do so; and doubtless much of the present day
dissipat:on among the poor is the direct outcome of their miserable
homes.
Easy and cheap transport to the outskirts of our large towns
would do away to a great extent with the need for the working classes
to live close to their work; houses would be cheaper and the children
would have a chance of growing up under natural and healthy
conditions.
Hitherto the houses erected by public bodies in the Metropolis
with the view of re-housing some of the population displaced by an
improvement scheme, have been too expensive (from 2/- to 3/6 per