HOUSING PROPOSALS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 104, 4 May 1936, Page 6

HOUSING PROPOSALS.

EFFECTS OF THE SCHEME,

(To the Edltor.V The Government intends to spend three million pounds on housing. If the Government is going to buy land and build houses it will cause eucli a sharp rise in land values with the same disastrous results as we had before when the Government entered into buying land. It will also have the same result on the price of building material. The sawmills are now running at full pressure and the builders are just as capable of providing the houses as the grocers and butchers are capable of providing us with food. Government and council house-building schemes have always been a failure and the taxpayers have to make good the loss. The City Council's proposal to build flats (birth-control houses) in Grey's Avenue is another farce. In any case, Grey's Avenue is distinctly a manufacturing area. Residences all around this part are rapidly giving way to factories and shops. What the Government should do is to provide cheap money for building homes and for rebuilding a lot of the old hovels in Auckland. This was a great success until the Government started to lend too much on inflated valuations. It is never safe for either the Government or the private money-lender to loan the full value of the property. OLD AUCKLAND BUILDER.