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are so dirty, careless and destructive in their habits that
the wonder is they can find owners of property willing
to let them into the houses under any conditions.
Section 25, Part II. Public Health Act (Amendment) Act
which has been adopted by the Council will enable us to
deal satisfactorily with the nuisance of the dirty, unpaved
back yards and gardens, to which allusion has been
made in previous reports. It was again noticeable that
in the portions of the district comprising Burns, Milton,
Wordsworth and Shelly Roads, a purely working-class
neighbourhood comprising property which has shown
many structural and sanitary defects from time to time,
there were no cases of Infectious sickness notified.
Section 31 of the Public Health Acts (Amendment)
Act enables Local Authorities to deal with unfenced
lands adjoining streets, and as we have a good many
plots in various parts of the district in this unfenced
condition which may quite reasonably be included as
coming within the scope of the Act I, hope the Council
will put into force their new powers in this matter.
Some of these plots are now made use of for the deposit
of all kinds of rubbish which, in the case of animal and
vegetable refuse, soon becomes a nuisance and
dangerous to health.
HOUSING, TOWN PLANNING, &c., ACT, 1909.
This Act was passed in the last Session of Parliament,
and confers important additional powers and
duties upon the Council.
Part III. of the Housing of the Working Classes Act,
1890, which enables Local Authorities to provide, houses
for the working-classes, is put in force throughout the
whole country. This part of the Act has in the past
been only adoptive.
The new Act greatly increases facilities for the
acquiring of land for the purposes of the Housing Act,
doing away with the necessity of a Provisional Order,
confirmed by Parliament, which has previously been
necessary before authority for this purpose could be
obtained. It provides facilities for loans made by the
Public Works Loan Commissioners for periods up to 80
years at the minimum rate of interest allowed, the rate
not to vary with the term allowed for payment.
Powers are given for the enforcement of the execution
of the Housing Act by the Local Government Board
where Local Authorities are lax in taking action. The
law as regards the closing and demolition of dwellings
unfit for human habitation is simplified and strengthened.