London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972
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Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
Woolwich 1936
[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Woolwich]
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of accommodation rendered vacant by the transfer of families, and the number of
families for whom accommodation had to be provided on account of slum clearance
schemes, gave the following results for Woolwich:—
TABLE No. 35.
| Additional Dwellings required on the Standard of Table I. in the First Schedule to the 1935 Act. | Additional Dwellings required on the standard of 1½ persons a room. | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Size. | Number. | 3 rooms. | 4 rooms. | 5 rooms. | 6 rooms. | 7 rooms. | 8 rooms. |
| 3 rooms | 51 | 40 | 8 | 3 | |||
| 4 room | 71 | 28 | 39 | 4 | |||
| 5 rooms | 25 | 5 | 9 | 10 | |||
| 6 rooms | 2 | 2 | |||||
| 7 rooms | |||||||
| 149 | 40 | 36 | 47 | 13 | 10 | 3 | |
Following on this the Borough Council resolved that they would not provide
any of these 149 houses for the abatement of overcrowding, as the duty of so doing
is placed by the Act on the London County Council, unless a Borough Council or
other body, decide to provide it or any portion of it, themselves. The London
County Council were so informed in July, 1936. Accommodation for this purpose
will be ready about March, 1937, on sites at Bellingham, Mottingham, Park Lane,
Charlton, and Whitefoot Lane, Lewisham.
Fixing of appointed days.—In order to bring into operation the overcrowding
provisions of the Housing Act of 1935, it was necessary for the Minister of Health
to fix appointed days for different purposes and for different localities.
The Minister fixed, so far as Woolwich was concerned, the 1st July, 1936, as
the appointed day under Section 6 of the Act and the 1st January, 1937, as the
appointed day under Sections 3, 4, 8 and 68. The effect of fixing such days meant
that on the 1st January, 1937, the notice prescribed by the Act as to "permitted
numbers," etc., must be inserted in every rent book, that after that date overcrowding
might constitute an offence, and that certain housing by-laws ceased to have effect.
The fixing of appointed days added considerably to the work of the department.
It became necessary to measure the rooms of all working class houses, and the Ministry
of Health, in a Circular, pointed out that it would be more advantageous to undertake
systematic measurement of the bulk, if not all, of the working class houses