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43
Schemes in
preparation
In accordance with the procedure recommended by the Local Government Manpower
Committee, an annual capital building programme comprising eighteen new schemes,
costing more than 1,000 was submitted in November. In addition a number of schemes
remained from previous programmes, and these were carried forward as part of the
building programme for the next financial year. Unless, however, there is a marked
relaxation in the restrictions on steel and expenditure it seems inevitable that many of
these schemes will have to be held over until later and less stringent times.
Details were included in the report for 1951 of 41 schemes submitted in that or
previous years to the Minister. Of these, one had been cancelled by the Health Committee,
two were withdrawn, because they were for adaptations of office accommodation
which had become matters for reference to the Minister of Housing and Local Government,
two had failed to receive the approval of the Minister of Health, five had been
completed, eight were in progress and twenty-three were either under consideration by
the Minister or full details had not been submitted to him. Five other schemes (Brook
ambulance station, Eridge House day nursery, Moatside occupation centre, Pear Place
temporary ambulance garage and Queen's Road centre Interim Stage II, adaptations),
which were not included in any previous programme were approved for submission to
the Minister of Health during the year.
The capital building programme for 1953-54, comprising 18 schemes therefore brings
the total number of schemes submitted to 61 excluding the three already cancelled or
withdrawn. During the year one more scheme was cancelled by the Health Committee,
while action on three others was postponed. Seven schemes were completed, and works
on nine more were in hand at the end of the year.
Particulars of the 33 schemes outstanding from earlier programmes, five extra schemes,
and of the 18 schemes submitted in November, 1952, are as follows:
Schemes for
which
approval was
refused
Division 2—Daleham Gardens, Hampstead.—Combined maternity and child welfare centre.
Following a review of the clinic facilities in the metropolitan borough of Hampstead, a
further proposal that the Minister should be asked to reconsider his decision not to
approve this project or, if he could not do this, to agree in principle to the erection of
part of the building which would be modified to form a maternity and child welfare
and school treatment centre was under consideration by the Health Committee at the
end of the year.
Division 5—Brewhotise Lane, Stepney.—Permanent day nursery and child welfare centre.
Following the Minister's refusal it was decided to investigate the possibility of retaining
the Old Church Road day nursery or finding a site for its replacement.
Scheme
withdrawn
Division 1—Gloucester Road and Clareville Grove, Kensington.—In view of the Minister's
inability to sanction the provision of a day nursery and staff hostel on the site, and the
fact that there was no immediate prospect of final approval being given to the provision
of a maternity and child welfare centre, the Health Committee decided that no further
action should be taken to develop this site for health service purposes and that the
property should be relinquished by the Committee.
Schemes
postponed
Division 1—Westway, Hammersmith.—The Minister of Health had asked for a revised
plan for a smaller and cheaper day nursery. It was decided, however, to review the need
for this nursery in twelve months' time, and in the meantime to retain the site, which is
large enough for a day nursery and a health centre, and to seek the approval in principle
of the Minister of Health to the erection on the site of a combined maternity and child
welfare centre and school treatment centre to be designed as the first instalment of a
comprehensive health centre.
Division 7—Queen's Road Centre, Camberwell.—The scheme for the second stage of the
adaptation of these premises provided for the installation of a supplementary heating
and hot water supply system, installation of a passenger lift shaft, the conversion of a
portion of the premises into classrooms, redecorating, electrical work and lay-out of
grounds. The Minister of Health intimated that the steel required for these adaptations
could not be authorised during 1952; nor could the allocation of building resources to