HOUSING CONDITIONS

Grey River Argus, 18 June 1925, Page 6

HOUSING CONDITIONS

AT MIXING TOWNS. One of the causes of a coal miner’s I • iss.it’.st.cfion is the environment in which he lives. Attention has been called in recent years to the conditions of miners' housing in Xe’w Zealand. Tho Coal Commission set up under the Board of Trade in J 919 scathingly condemned them, particularly at Bur nett’s Face and Blackball. Alany of the houses in those places are not fit for human habitation—the small are small, dark, and too few, and some are over crowded as to provide neither for I health, nor for decencv and comfort. Tn the majority of cases there are neither baths nor gardens, i’he condii tions are specially hard for women, who, because thev have often to work and provide for r«en working on successive shifts. hr.-«' special need for proper housing conditions. An impartial investigation would ]»rove that, on the whole, the housing conditions of tho miners are worse than those of any other se t ion of the community. Almost every traveller or tourist knows that, in spite of the wealth which it produces, tho average mining village, in tend of being laid out on a proper plan, is an eyesore on the landscape. The failure of royalty owners (the Dawes Estate in Blackkball is a case in point) to return some share of good fortune to provide for the social welfare of those without whose labour the royalties could not be paid, is 1-e-iring its Inevitable fruit in the unrest of to-day. True, after considerable ajotation on the part of f h<* miners’ leado: some effort is being made to deal i the position, hut the point is iha,, in future, before any coal measures me leased or worked, tlw* Government should make it one of the terms of the ease that suitable bousing acrnmnindation is provided for the miners, who. after all. are certainly enU’tlel 1 • just as good housing conditions :>s tho coal owner, the coal merchant. °r anv otb°r individual who makes profit out of the winning and sale of this iiuportanr and necessarv c.,Tn modi tv.