SYDNEY HOUSING

Evening Star, Issue 23749, 3 December 1940, Page 3

SYDNEY HOUSING

SHORTAGE OF KGMES Building experts estimate that at least 25,000 more homes aro required in the Sydney metropolitan area to meet the present urgent requirements of home-seekers (says tho Sydney ‘Morning Herald’). This fact was contained in the report of the housing section of tho Social Problems Committee of the Diocese of Sydney submitted to the Synod last week. Attention was also directed to tho report of tho Housing and Improvement Board of New South Wales, which states that there are at least 30,000 homes in tho metropolitan area which were built many years before there was any health control or supervision of building activities. Most of these houses are classified as “ sub-standard ” and as having “ outlived their usefulness.” “ Sub-standard ” moans that the home is below tho standard that would now be regarded by councils and building authorities as the lowest permissible for human occupancy. Such homes may be of solid construction with sound walls, but have crude or insufficient cooking and sanilary arrangements, have inadequate facililios for home privacy, make no pretence towards an (esthetic outlook, and have insufficient space for playgrounds and gardens.

The report of the Synod points out that the obvious remedy is to build additional homos to be let at rentals within tha moans of those occupying over-crowded or insanitary homes, but that the financial and economic conditions make this impracticable for private enterprise. Cottages in the inner suburbs, the report adds, do not appear to be a financially profitable proposition because of the high cost of land and the relative larger area occupied by cottages compared with flats. Homes, it is emphasised, could not be provided at lower rents without some form of Government subsidy. If the cost of land and building were taken at the arbitary figure of £BOO per dwelling the total cost of 25,000 new homes would be £20,000,000. The additional cost of rebuilding 30,000 old sub-standard homes in and near Sydney would, the report emphasises, be at least £24,000,000, making a total of £44,000,000 “ for merely rectifying Sydney’s most obvious shortcom-

ings.” For this reason Hie report recommended, and the Synod agreed, that Lbe matter of better bousing for tbe people, and more especially for workers and those on tbe basic wage, was one requiring the urgent attention of both the State and Federal Governments, as in lbe absence of a Grcaler Sydney County Council, with ample powers and funds to deal with housing, the problem was beyond tbe power of the Sydney City Council and tho adjoining municipal councils. The report further stated that there was little probability of any comprehensive housing scheme being put intb operation during the continuance of the war, but the whole question should be thoroughly investigated, and preliminary arrangements made to put a scheme of bettor bousing into operation when the opportunity offered.