the department in many parts of the North Island at costs ranging from £2,050 to £2,300. Let us have a look at a typical three-bedroom house, plan number 3/1. Its area is 855 square feet, or just a little under the average size of the homes the department builds. Its general appearance is no different from a European house. It is big enough to house a family with four children comfortably. (See page 31, top.) How is the floor space made up? Only 50 square feet is given to passages. The rest is all for living and sleeping. Bedroom space is just enough from a health viewpoint. The living room of 180 square feet is, however, well above the legal minimum and of comfortable size. The kitchen is not big enough to eat in, but it is the right size for the mother of a biggish family to work in. Like many other departmental plans, this one is easy to add to, if the need arises, by extending the present sleeping porch. Incidentally, the plan service offers sleeping porches in most of its designs. They are particularly suited to Maori homes. One reason is, of course, they are handy for putting up guests. Secondly, air and light are of special importance because of the danger of T.B. The window space in a sleeping porch is larger than in an ordinary bedroom. The Maori housing organization can, under its statutes, help any descendant of a Maori, whatever the proportion of Maori blood. In actual fact, it could never hope to build houses for the whole of this group. There are about 130,000 Maoris and the number rises by 3,000 every year. In addition many who are counted as Europeans by the census are Maoris under the Maori Housing Act. With an output of just over 500 houses last year, the building organization can fill only part of their need. A recent policy statement from the Secretary of Maori Affairs shows how the department allocates its effort. It deals with eligible applicants in one of four ways: 1. A house may be constructed for them by the building organization. 2. They may be granted a loan for a house to be built by a private contractor. 3. They may be referred to another lending agency such as the State Advances Corporation. 4. If a deserving applicant is living in bad conditions but the paying of normal instalments is proved to be a hardship, he may be considered for a loan out of the special housing fund and The living room in the house of Mr C. Lindsay, Grey Lynn, Auckland. (photo: clifton firth).