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15
the Public Health Department. Systematic house-to-house inspection
under the regulations governing this form of inspection enables careful
records to be kept of the housing conditions in each part of the
Borough. The results of these inspections are entered up on the card
index system, so that the conditions found on inspection and re-inspection
of any particular street and any house in that street can easily be
ascertained. Administration of the health services is made more
difficult by the fact that in Hackney, with its total population of
217,200, there is also, quoting from the last Census return, a population
of 28,457 persons, equal in number to many Urban Districts, living
in 9,981 two-room dwellings, and 9,627 living in 5,649 one-room
dwellings; 1,059 of these one-roomed dwellings housed families of 3 or
more persons and 63 of these one-roomed dwellings housed families
containing from 5 to 9 persons in the family. In spite of the difficulties
that the housing conditions obviously make, it is indeed a matter
of great satisfaction that the health of the Borough should, on the
whole, remain so good.
The importance of the housing problem and the enormous difficulty
of finding a solution has resulted in the formation of a number
of associations and organisations to improve matters in this respect,
but the problem remains as difficult and as embarrassing as before.
Probably the most peculiar expedients are those advanced by the
Property Owners' Protection Association who, in a circular letter
dated January 1st, 1929, under the heading" Slums and Overcrowding
cannot be Abolished without just, urgent, and necessary alterations
in the Law,''' urge the peculiar remedies that it shall be made easier
for owners to eject tenants, and more expensive for local authorities
to acquire and clear unhealthy areas. The actual paragraphs are as
follows:—
" Two great obstacles exist to any adequate reform.
(a) So long as the Rent Restrictions Acts remain in force, owners are
powerless to deal with dirty tenants, and overcrowded houses, as the Courts
refuse to make orders for ejectment, in spite of the prevalence of such
conditions.
(b) The second obstacle is the notoriously iniquitous and unjust confiscation
of property by clearance schemes under Section 46 of the Housing
Act, 1925, whereby less than the actual site value of the land is paid for
property taken, and nothing at all for the houses (although they may be
sound and in good repair) merely because they happen to be in an alleged
unhealthy area.'"
There is a further paragraph, which in justice to the Association,
should be quoted, but it will not make much impression on anyone who
realises the difficulties experienced in dealing with difficult owners,
some of whom seek the assistance of the Association : —
"The Association wishes to make it quite clear that we do not in any
way defend the existence of houses which are unfit for human habitation
in consequence of structural defects or irreparable dilapidation, neither do
we suggest that compensation should be paid for any such buildings."