FREE FROM SLUMS

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19199, 16 December 1936, Page 5

FREE FROM SLUMS

CHRISTCHURCH AREAS SUB-NORMAL HOUSING AMPLE LIGHT AND AIR RECONSTRUCTION PLANS (Per Press Association.) CHRISTCHURCH, this day. “I asked at least half a dozen persons to be shown the slums of Christchurch. We Baw all the ‘slums, socalled, within 20 minutes and, frankly, to U 8 they appeared to be merely sub-normal housing. Indeed it was pleasing to find, after imploring to be shown the worst housing conditions prevalent in Christchurch that, apart from the need for new construction, we could go away feeling that there was scarcely anything in the city that couU be described as a slum,’’ said Mr.. J. A. Lee, the Undersecretary to the Department of Housing, yesterday in an interview. Mr. Lee said it took a combination oi factors, to make a slum. As a rule the constitution of 51 slum involved not only an aggregation of old houses, but congestion of them in a little space with lack of light and air. , LAND ACQUIRED It would be difficult, he added, to find any substantial combination of these factors in Christchurch, and certainly difficult to find old houses so closely congested that there was a shortage of light and air. There was difficulty in finding houses for rent in Christchurch, and that was obviously a situation calling for. fresh construction. The Department of Housing hoped soon to be ready to engage in building construction in Christchurch. The department, he said, had acquired land for houses in different places at prices which showed an astonishing saving over the figure paid for adjacent sections in the boom days. Mr. Leo said that his attention had been drawn to the difficulty with which the' city was faced in controlling the acquisition of large houses and their conversion into rooming houses with adequate sanitary provision. It might be that legislation to control that type of reconstruction was necessary. There had been some misapprehension concerning the Government’s decision to establish two joinery factories in the North Island. With the programme the Government had now in hand, -however, the joinery factories would do little more than take up the peak load of the demand for joinery necessary to ensure the success of the State housing scheme. No investigation had been made relating to the establishment of joinery factories in the South Island.