WHO MAKES IT UP?

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 55, 2 September 1944, Page 6

WHO MAKES IT UP?

! 'Not. one penny piece had been taken ! from State funds for the purpose of subsidising the rentals of State houses, said the member for Wellington-South' (Mr. McKeen) during the Budget debate, and, despite the .fact that building costs had risen by 26 per cent., the rentals had not been increased. It is pertinent to ask how the difference has been met. If the cost of building, has risen by 26 per cent, since 1939, the houses'now being built are either being let at a loss or the rent charged for houses built at lower cost were let at a figure which- provided .for an excessive margin. Obviously, it is not possible for the Government to differentiate, in the rental charged for a house built in 1939 and a similar house built in 1944. Just as obviously the present position cannot be allowed to continue. Mr. Mc'Keen, although he did not say so directly, inferred that there was nothing in the suggestion that taxpayers were paying for something that was being handed out'gratis to tenants .of State houses. But if there is a loss on houses built under present conditions, it must be made up in some way. It is for the Government td explain how. The Government chose to become a landlord in a big way, and it is for the Government to say how it proposes to get over the position referred to by Mr. McKee'n. Those people who have been /unable to get' State houses—©ld or new—but have had to meet their problem by building at higher costs would not relish, now or in the future, having'to bear part of the cost of a cheaper State house for somebody else. If this has not been done in the past and will not be done in the future, how is the difficulty to be met?