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ascertain what the additional work under the by-laws entails—how far
one inspector could go as regards registering the houses and subsequently
following up his demands and seeing that the requisite cleansing, repairs,
etc., are carried out—and, secondly, because so many important items of
the tenement house by-laws are suspended during the operation of the
Rent Restriction Acts, the repeal of which would make a very great
difference to the work of the new by-laws. The following points concerning
the by-laws are worthy of special note. A lodging house is
defined as "a house or part of a house intended or used for occupation
by the working classes and let in lodgings or occupied by members of
more than one family, but shall not include a house in which the tenant
resides on the premises and in which not more than two persons in
addition to the tenant and his family also reside at any one time."
This definition therefore excludes from the operation of the by-laws
a house in which not more than two persons in addition to the tenant and
his family reside, but, when confirming the by-laws, the Minister of
Health approved them, except in so far as they apply to any lodging
house in which the tenant resides and not more than one family is lodged.
The action of the Minister has thus widened the original exclusion and a
house is now exempt in which not more than one family in addition to
the tenant and his family is lodged. A house containing two families
may, therefore, be exempt from the by-laws, provided one of the two
families is that of the "Tenant," who is defined in the by-laws as "the
person (whatever may be the nature or extent of his interest in the
premises) by whom or on whose behalf a lodging-house is let in lodgings
or for occupation by members of more than one family, or who, for the
time being, receives or is entitled to receive the profits arising from the
said letting," but should the tenant not be resident at the premises in
question, then such a house would come within the scope of the by-laws.
The work of inspecting the 160 premises already referred to,
necessitated the paying of 1,309 visits by the inspector and the serving
of 108 notices relating to various breaches of the by-laws.
London County Council Housing Estate at Watling.
During the year the erection of a Housing Estate by the London
County Council, known as the Watling Estate, had a direct effect upon
Hampstead, inasmuch as the County Council offered a certain number of
houses to our most crowded families. We were allocated a certain number
under a quota. For this there was no agreement, and no financial