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3. This means that the number of houses to be considered for representation
is determined not only by the condition of these houses but by the availability
of others, as there is no point in making a Demolition Order for a
house which, because the occupants cannot be housed elsewhere, cannot in
fact be demolished. Because of the competing demands of other families
on houses which may become available, there have been some other factors
in addition to the mere opinion of a house being unfit for human habitation
which has been present in the case of those houses which have been brought
to the notice of the committee.
4. The Housing Regulations required local authorities to arrange for
the systematic examination of all houses in their district with a view to steps
being taken in regard to those houses which were unfit, either to render them
fit or to demolish them. It was such routine housing inspections which
brought to light these unfit houses. For years these inspections have not been
carried out, so that to-day's knowledge of the numbers of such houses rests
largely on information yielded by surveys carried out before 1939.
5. By that year, Clearance Orders had been made in respect of a number
of groups of houses. Some of these houses, however, had not been demolished
by September, 1939 ; a number have been demolished since the end of the
war. There are still standing 5 of those included in the Brewery Cottage
Order; 4 of those included in one of the Stanmore High Street Orders, and
the 20 in the Headstone Drive Clearance Order. In addition, there are still
being occupied 10 houses which were before the war the subject of Demolition
Orders.
The houses in Poets' Corner were, in 1939, the subject of an enquiry
with a view to making a number of Clearance Orders. All the houses were
included in the representations, not because they were all considered to be
unfit, but because it was considered that the best way of dealing with all
the houses on the site was by clearance. The Ministry agreed to the demolition
of five houses only. At various times since 1939, a number of houses
have been pulled down : the Council recently made Orders in respect of 22
properties. There are other houses which are in almost as bad a condition,
and which must soon be represented, these including 4, 6, 8 and 10 Shelley
Road ; 23, 25, 27 and 29 Milton Road, together with a number of properties
on the odd-numbered side of Shelley Road and the even-numbered side of
Milton Road.
There are yet further houses which should be represented, but whose
condition is very much that of some other houses in the district and which
can be considered only against the background of the need to deal with these
others. Then there are the remainder which will not for a long time need
to be considered.
6. Besides all these, there were 222 houses which were listed as being
those which would first have to be considered with a view to demolition.
Of these, a small number already have had to be dealt with, leaving 212
in this list. That some of them have in this way had to be dealt with, confirms
the soundness of the original selection. Furthermore, although it has
been necessary to make Demolition Orders in recent years on some other
houses which were not included in that list, this was necessary because of such
conditions as settlements—conditions which could not have been foreseen
some years before—and not because of the presence of the usual type of
sanitary defect or dilapidation found in an ageing house. It is felt, then,
that it can be accepted that the list of 222, comprised the houses which, in
1939, more urgently called for examination with a view to the possibility