The Press FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 1948. Housing

Press, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 25608, 24 September 1948, Page 6

The Press FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 1948. Housing

For some years now the Ministry of Works has professed to doubt whether the housing shortage is really as serious as the man in the street has believed it to be. Two years ago its annual report threw doubt on information—received, presumably, from its housing construction branch, the State Advances •Department, the Rehabilitation Department, and other agencies which register the demand for houses—indicating that the Dominion was then short of some 25,000 houses, and that 180,000, or 12,000 a year, would be needed over the following 15 years. “ The figures have “ been accepted with some reserva- “ tions and are now being subjected “to an independent check ”, the report added. Last year’s report, although admitting “at present a “ very grave housing shortage ”, again questioned the same figures, which, it said, were “ popularly “ quoted ” as representing the housing shortage. This uncertainty was convenient to politicians who wished to throw the least unfavourable light on a very bad situation. Thus, not long before the General Election of 1946, the Prime Minister was able to say, with a semblance of authority from the department most closely concerned, that

if plans now well advanced were put into effect the Dominion would have overcome its housing difficulties within two years; and within three years, if the problem were tackled as were the needs of war, the supply of houses should be abreast of tne country’s needs.

The uncertainty was especially convenient when current building activity was so clearly inadequate. In the two years following that in which the Ministry’s “ informants ” estimated the immediate shortage at 25,000 houses, only 9000 and 9463 respectively were built. This year, for the first time, the original target of 12,000 houses was hit. It may be only coincidence that this year, for the first time, the Ministry of Works has accepted the original estimate of the annual requirements. Indeed, it has admitted that the estimate was conservative. The requirement accepted in the latest report is not 12,000 a year. That, the Ministry concedes, is the minimum building rate necessary to overtake the shortage, not this year or next year (as Mr Fraser projected with pre-election persuasiveness), not even soon, but over “ many years ”.