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215
KOSSUTH BUILDINGS.
The history of these buildings, and the houses known as Ann's Place which
formerly stood on the same site, and the proceedings of the Vestry in reference
thereto, is instructive as to the fallibility of legal machinery for the removal of
houses unfit for habitation, and for the prevention of the erection of houses unfit
for habitation.
The old houses were condemned in 1876, under Torrens' Act, against which
condemnation the owner appealed to the Quarter Sessions, and the premises were
visited by the Bench of Magistrates, and although the houses were found situated
in a court only 11 feet wide, into which a ray of sunlight never fell, and although
they were in the last stage of dilapidation, and traversed with a disused sewer full
of sewage into which the walls were evidently settling, the magistrates nevertheless
decided to allow the owner to effect alterations which he asserted would make the
houses fit for habitation. A great deal of work was then done to sustain the
tottering walls; the sewer was removed, and the grosser defects remedied, and the
houses were again occupied. The Vestry having spent in legal proceedings a
sum not less than £500.
The conditions again became so urgent, that in 1889 a summons in reference
to one of the houses was taken out at the instance of Mr. Bennett Burleigh of the
Daily Telegraph. At the hearing I related to the magistrate the action taken by
the Vestry, and at my request he visited the place, with the result that a closing
order was made in reference to No. 9, and subsequently, on pressure by the Vestry,
all the houses were closed and demolished, and Ann's Place was advertised as a
building site. In 1890, plans were submitted for the erection thereon of a block
of so-called model dwellings. It was at once evident that those plans were wanting
in proper sanitary provisions, and a letter was therefore addressed to the building
owner in October, 1890, notifying him that the plans were not satisfactory, and
that if buildings were erected on those plans, it would be the duty of the Medical
Officer of health to advise the Vestry to take proceedings to have them closed as
unfit for habitation.
Nevertheless the buildings were erected on those plans and occupied, and in
last October, within twelve months of being occupied, the walls of many of the
rooms were found to be soddened with sewaga, and application was therefore made
to Worship Street Police Court for a closing order. That application was not
effectual, the magistrate being influenced by the circumstance that they were new
buildings and (without inspecting their condition himself), would only order some
of the worst of the tenements to be closed. A few more months elapsed when, as
this report is passing through the press, it became necessary to make another
application to the Court, with the result that an order was obtained for closing the
whole of the premises.
T