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109
From the foregoing it will be seen that no action was taken under the
provisions of the Housing Acts during the year under consideration. This
is in accordance with the traditional policy of the Council.
Since the War individual houses have been dealt with almost entirely
by means of vigorous action under the Public Health (London) Act. A
house to house inspection was commenced in January, 1920, since when the
Inspectors have covered the Borough two-and-a-half times. This inspection
has been the means of bringing to light and remedying a vast number of
nuisances, and has proved of great value in maintaining the health of the
Borough.
The houses in Shoreditch, however, are old, and no matter how many
notices, formal and informal are complied with, their age sooner or later
renders them derelict and unfit for human habitation and ultimately reduces
them to a condition in which the District Surveyor must order their partial
or complete demolition.
The Housing Acts contain provisions under which, subject to certain
conditions being satisfied, it is possible for the Council to secure that a house
shall be made in all respects fit for human habitation. In practice, however,
so many difficulties are encountered in the application of this part of the
Act, that, as explained above, action under the Public Health Act has been
preferred.
Whatever may be done by way of slum clearance, it is essential if the
remaining houses are not to be allowed slowly to degenerate into slums in
their turn, that some workable scheme should be evolved whereby extensive
re-conditioning of ageing house property may be effected.
The mention of slum clearance brings to mind the Ministry of Health
circular No. 1331 dealing with this subject. The receipt of this circular does
not fall within the period covered by this Report, but as it constitutes the most
inspiring official call to action in the matter of slum clearance that has ever
been issued, and as Shoreditch is an area in which this social evil is present
in an acute form, it is permissible to express the hope that by the time the
next Report comes to be written, it will at last be possible to record that a comprehensive
and far-seeing scheme for the abolition of our slums is being put
into effect.
Dangerous Structure Notices.
The numbers of these notices served during the last three years has been
as follows : —
1930—148; 1931—190; 1932—211.
These notices afford some indication of the dilapidation that is so common
in the Borough. In considering these figures it must be remembered
that they relate only to notices actually served and that a great deal of work
is carried out by owners in anticipation of the District Surveyor's Notice.
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