CONDITIONS OF OLD PEOPLE

Press, Volume XCVI, Issue 28362, 22 August 1957, Page 14

CONDITIONS OF OLD PEOPLE

Complaint By Miss Howard (New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, August 21. Old persons were living in shocking conditions at premises which should be licensed as private hospitals, said Miss M. B. Howard (Opposition, Sydenham) in the House of Representatives this afternoon. “Some of these places are death traps, and filthy in the extreme,” said Miss Howard. She said she had information on premises in Auckland, Wellington, and Christchurch where pensioners and other old persons, who had nowhere else to go, were living under deplorable circumstances. Miss Howard was speaking on a question she had asked the Minister of Health (Mr J. A. Hanan) about alarming statements made at the private hospitals’ conference on conditions in some hospitals. In his written reply, Mr Hanan said the conditions referred to at the conference did not exist in licensed private hospitals. The department would investigate any cases reported to it. Miss Howard said it was time the premises were registered, and she would hand the letters she had received to the Minister. Mr H. R. Lake (Government, Lyttelton) said he agreed with a lot of what Miss Howard had said so far as Christchurch was concerned, and he commended her remarks to the Minister.