"A VILE SPOT"

Evening Post, Volume XCI, Issue 93, 19 April 1916, Page 8

"A VILE SPOT"

SLUMS AND PUBLIC HEALTH DISCUSSION AT THE CITY COUNCIL. '"A vile spot, a very bad place,'' was Councillor Godber's description last evening of premises in the heart of the city, which, it is urged by the City Council, should be condemned by the Health Department. Councillor Bennett said he' wished all the councillors had seen the sights and scenes that he had seen, and to which Councillor Godber had referred. They were deplorable. ■ ' '. ■ Councillor John Fuller, jun., said a proclamation could be put over the locality in question and warehouses could be erected in it. Councillor Veitch had inspected the locality. He found the houses of the Chinese there were bare, but clean, and those inhabited by Europeans were horribly, dirty. But if these dirty people were ejected from the slums, where were they to go, for they were so dirty that if put, into a drawing room they would turn it into a pig-sty in a, few minutes. Councillor L. M'Kenzie admitted that he had visited these places with the inspectors and there was no doubt that they were filthy At the same time he would not admit that they were slums. Councillor B. A. Wright agreed with the report of the Health Committee, that something should be done, but it was no use simply condemning the buildings. It was not the buildings themselves but the way they were kept. If the buildings were wiped out where could these people be put? Mr. Flanagan, the City Planner, had remarked in this connection: "What do you call these slums. Why they're little glass houses." Councillor J. Hutcheson said that the council was faced witlr the necessity for building flats, not only for the working class but the middle classes. Some of these places were owned by people who held up their heads in high respectability. He happened to know that one of the owners was previously the owner of a series of rabbit warrens in a certain street which were hired out to prostitutes at an exorbitant rate and where men got their heads split open on a Saturday night. He knew of scores of families who were living in private hotels simply because they could not afford to pay rents. Councillor Luckie pointed out that great difficulty was experienced in insisting that dirty people kept their places clean. The\ council should have power to send its own sanitary officers into such places and have people fined for keeping their places dirty. The landlord was not .always to blame. It might be heresy to say so, but they manage these things very much better in Germany. He was not enamoured of the fiat system, because it was liable to failure through one unsatisfactory tenant. Councillor Frost said cheap transit for getting the people out into the suburbs was a partial solution, and then they could tackle the slum problems. Something could be done by the Miramar Borough Council, which had ample vacant land available for dwellings, but so long as it imposed its- iniquitous charge of double fares on Saturday halfholidays, Sundays, and holidays it could not expect its borough to become popular as a residential area; besides, it needed a very much better tram service, too, before Miramar—which' could afford great relief to congestion in the city—would be freely built upon as it ought to be. Councillor J. Godber said that good would come of the discussion. The Health Committee's hands would be strengthened and it would deal with the matter with the gloves off. Jt would probably bring down recommendations on the lines of those made some five or six years ago. Councillor M'Kenzie said that although the locality was looked upon as a "slum area," he believed that not one case of infantile paralysis had been reported there. The council adopted the clause in the Health Committee's report that certain premises be inspected with a view to condemnation.