STATE HOUSING

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 147, 18 March 1937, Page 12

STATE HOUSING

Tenders Accepted For Auckland SAVING OF £99 A HOUSE Fletcher Construction Company’s Success Most of the contracts for the erection of houses for the State Housing Department on the Orahei block in Auckland liave been secured by the Fletcher Construction Company, whose tenders were substantially lower than the nearest to them. Under separate contracts the company will build no fewer than 208 out of a total of 212 houses for which competitive tenders were called. The Fletcher Construction Company has also obtained the lease of the State’s, new joinery factory at Penrose, near Auckland. The rental has not yet been disclosed. The Prime Minister, Rt. Hon. M. J. Savage, announced last evening that 109 tenders were received for the 36 contracts in the Orakei scheme of State housing. “The two large contracts, comprising 91 and 87 houses respectively, will be awarded to the Fletcher Construction Company, Limited,” said Mr. Savage. ‘-The acceptance of this firm’s tender will result in a saving of £99 per house over the next lowest tender. “Of the remaining 34 contracts, each of one house, 30 will be awarded to the Fletcher Construction Company, Limited, as that firm was the lowest tenderer by a substantial margin in each case. Consideration of the tenders for the remaining four is not yet complete, as there are certain discrepancies in the tenders submitted, by some contractors, which require to be cleared up. “The lease of the Penrose joinery factory has also been granted to the Fletcher Construction Company, Limited.”

For the State housing scheme in Wellington it was announced on January 30 last that 35 tenders for 19 separate contracts had been received by the Government, and that the successful tenderers for the erection of the various houses were the Fletcher Construction Company, Limited, and Messrs. Higgins and Arcus. The Fletcher Construction Company was also successful with its tender for the supply of joinery and a lease of the new factory and plant then under construction by the State on the Hutt Road. It was stated by the Prime Minister that f e company had to pay a rent of £3OOO a year for the lease of the factory, which sura included interest plus depreciation, such as would liquidate the cost of the factory in a few years, and, in addition, had to pay the ordinary income tax on its profit. BUILDING SITES Hundreds of Areas Offered For Purchase There appears to be no dearth of building sites in almost every community in New Zealand. The State Housing Department is being" inundated with offers of land for purcha.se. A statement on the subject was made yesterday by Mr. J. A. Lee, Parliamentary Under-Secretary to the Minister of Finance. "Hundreds of people are offering their land to the Government for purchase as sites for dwellings under the State housing scheme,” said Mr. Lee. ‘‘The desire to sell seems to be .so keen that within a few days after each offer is made a letter is sent to the department asking for information as to the position in regard to each particular area. It must be clearly understood that it is absolutely impossible for the Lands Department immediately to advise the Housing Department as to the value of the land submitted for purchase by the Government. All offers are filed for investigation when it is necessary for land to be acquired for the State housing scheme. In such cases the Lands Department is called upon to investigate the areas under offer and report on their value. Any other procedure would be impracticable because the Lands Department would be compelled to inspect and value land which .subsequently might never be taken over for State housing.”