GESTURE OR PRACTICAL POLICY?

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 84, 9 April 1938, Page 8

GESTURE OR PRACTICAL POLICY?

The divisions taken by the City Council on the housing.question were on political parly lines. This is much to be regretted. We have always deplored the introduction of [party politics in municipal affairs, and in dealing with the housing problem any attempt to seek a party solution must tend only to produce conflict and delay. The Mayor submitted a series of proposals for council action which can be taken immediately in furtherance of a general plan to co-operate with the Government and' private enterprise. He proposed to continue the policy of making council land available to the Government on the easiest terms, to make land available also on easy terms to private organisations, to obtain reports on areas suitable for demolition "with a view,to such areas being acquired by the council and let on long lease for the erection of groups of flats," and to secure amendment of the statutes and bylaws to bring them into accordance with modern requirements for flats and groups of flats. It will be observed that a very real advance of co-opera-tion is proposed, especially in the suggested acquisition of areas for demolition, thus sharing the burden of financial provision with the Government or private organisations prepared to undertake construction. The proposals, in fact, go as far as it is possible to go without the council entering the building field and undertaking all the risks and responsibilities of landlordism.

The Labour members of the council proposed instead that the council should, "co-operate with the Government in erecting homes" and should take advantage of the Government offer to make funds available for this purpose. "Co-operate with the Government in erecting homes" we assume to mean actual building by the municipality with municipal responsibility for any loss from sales or tenancies. There is every reason for the council's hesitation to accept such a course. It is not by any means proved that State action is superior to private enterprise in housing the people. Critics who say private enterprise has failed should add that, since the War, private enterprise has been discouraged by restrictions. When these restrictions were gradually tapered off in 1929 the volume of building rose to a height which has not since been attained with* all the prosperity and all the Government activity in housing. In Great Britain, on the other hand, a combination of Government action and encouragement to private building has produced a steady increase in the rate of houseconstruction. Comparison of these results might well deter the council from hasty adoption of a municipal building plan. Apart from this, there are practical arguments in the council's own previous experience of housing, and in the fact that extensive building operations would probably necessitate the creation of a special housing department, to be disbanded in a few years' time unless the council accepted house-building as a permanent duty of municipal government.

The conclusive argument against precipitate council entry into housebuilding is found, however, in the statement by Mr. J. A. Lee, Parliamentary Under-Sccrelary in Charge of Housing. Mr. Lee stated yesterday:

People might desire to see still more building< but finally the rate at which houses could be completed depended on one factor—the available labour — and there had been ,no idle building labour in Wellington for twelve months past.

The City Council has no power to increase the supply of labour. The Government is ihe only authority which can lake effective action for that purpose —except by introducing workers from abroad—and it would be interesting to know what results have attended Government cooperation with the building trades unions to bring more labour into building. Until there is proof that labour is available and that private enterprise cannot or will not employ it, it is futile to propose municipal building. In fact, the proposal has all the appearance of a gesture. It is not without significance, taken in conjunction with the party character of the divisions at the City Council, llint the official organ of the Labour Parly declared over two months ago:

This year Labour must make the [municipal] election fight a housing

fight. Every avenue must be exploited to awaken the public conscience to the necessity of getting to grips with vested interests.

Unless it can be shown that muni-| cipal building will achieve something more useful than competing for building labour already fully employed (thus making housing more expensive still), the Labour proposal must appear as influenced as much by a desire to secure ihe'adoption of a declared policy as by the wish to obtain the best results by other means. __________