POST-WAR HOUSING
HE Town and Country Planning Bill and two official reports recently issued by the Ministry of Health are signs that a ore definite shape is being imposed on the problem of the post- ar provision of houses. The first had to be introduced without elay to enable local authorities to go ahead with their schemes or rebuilding and development. The two reports have been ade by sub-committees of the Central Housing Advisory Com- nee appointed by the Minister, one, with Sir Felix Pole s chairman, dealing with Private Enterprise Housing, the other, nder the chairmanship of Lord Dudley, being concerned with e Design of Dwellings. Each of these presents recommenda- ons on vital practical questions connected with the major roblem of post-war housing. That problem is one which holds priority second to none in the programme of domestic recon- ruction. When the time comes for even a partial demobilisation f the armed forces and a partial change-over from war to civilian roduction, with some inevitable redistribution of the population, t will be a prime necessity to provide houses for the workers and heir families. Even in this time of war, with millions of men d women either abroad or accommodated by the Services, we re all aware of the difficulties of finding houses or even lodgings or the workers. How much more acute will it be when mobilisation is in process!
How vast the problem is may be judged by the fact that in e period before the war 300,000 to 350,000 houses were being uilt annually, and that since March, 1940, the number con- acted has been only 55,00o. That is a long way short of the umber of houses actually destroyed by enemy action, without ving any provision whatever for annual replacement during ore than four years of war. - The fact that a really remarkable ffort was made in the years between the two wars, in the con- traction of 4,200,000 houses in England and Wales, does not mean at we began this war with a surplus. In 19I9 there were heavy ears to be made up, and, in addition, the standards have been sing. In 1939 slum clearance still remained to be carried out, nd the local authorities today and tomorrow have to consider ombed areas and slum areas as part and parcel of the ame task that lies before them. The official reckoning that re is an immediate need for a million houses takes a too odest estimate of requirements. Attention has to be con- ntrated on the provision of from three to four million dwellings a period of ten to twelve years, and on getting the programme to full swing in the shortest possible time.
The years following the last war provide object-lessons and .amings. Then, as there may be now, there was the difficulty finding enough labour. Then, as now, there was the inflation costs of materials, and the problem of building houses at any- tug like the price that would admit of an economic rent. Mr. in has stated the principles which will be applied in fixing notifies for demobilisation. There will have to be considerable eviation from the general rules if enough men are to be set quickly work on the essential job of building. Builders must have a gh priority in the scheme of demobilisation. The provision of terials will be equally urgent, and an immediate practical con- eration both for local authorities and private enterprise will be of cost. It has been estimated by the House Builders' Asso- tion that a house which cost £340 in 1939 would have cost ally twice as much in November, 1943. Efforts will have to made to bring costs down so that they will correspond to the eneral level of the cost of living, and for that reason the pie Report recommends that a body for reviewing the prices materials should be kept in permanent commission. Subsidies clearly will be need. ed, and if houses for the working- classes are to be built by- private enterprise as well as by local authorities, then for some time to thole private enterprise also will have to be subsidised. In the period immediately fol- lowing the last war the local authorities had to bear the principal burden of providing working-class houses, but in the whole period down to .1939 nearly 3,000,000 out of 4,200,000 houses were constructed by private enterprise (433,000 with subsidies). It is extremely desirable that in the earlier short-term period private enterprik should be enabled to take its part in producing houses, and the Pole Committee recommends- that during this period it should be eligible for the Exchequer subsidy so far as it is meeting the same needs as local authorities. That will clearly involve a means of control. It is of the first importance that a large proportion of dwellings should be built for letting. To rank for subsidy they must conform to certain standards and to certain conditions regarding selling price or rent.
Here, then, is one aspect of the problem—the provision of labour, materials and sound finance, and enough houses. But houses of what kind? That is a scarcely less important question in this post-war period, when we may be less inclined to use grandiose talk about " homes fit for heroes," but when we shall certainly have to provide for a higher standard of decency and comfort than that with which the workers have put up in the past. This is the subject of the report of the Dudley Com- mittee, which was appointed to consider the design, planning, layout, standards of construction and equipment of dwellings for the people throughout the country." In starting a great national drive for the better housing of the nation it is essential to avoid the defects of the past—not merely the drabness and squalor of the nineteenth century, but the monotony of the inter-war period, the cramped accommodation for living, the- inadequacy of outbuildings, and the absence of labour-saving devices and com- forts. To get the least that we demand we should be sure that those who are preparing schemes should employ trained architects, and that we should draw on that great body of professional talent with which this country is better supplied than most. The Com- mittee recommend local authorities to concentrate on three-bed- roomed houses, with two good rooms on the ground floor, with a separate place for laundry Ind similar work, bathrooms and w.c.s in different compartments, and adequate arrangements for a coal range and other utilities. It is easy to be critical of the details recommended, and to suggest, for example, that the Committee have overlooked refrigerators, alternative methods of heating and cooking, the possibility of cellars, etc. These are matters which will require much consideration ; the appoint-. ment of the best architects should itself tend to ensure against the neglect of what has been forgotten and against a tiresome uniformity.
In housing, as in any other great enterprise, we must not fail to see the wood for the trees. A house is not as a rule. an individual thing, sufficient within itself. It is part of a neighbour- hood—a village, a town, or a city. re abuts on roads or squares or crescents. It is in a certain relationship to streets and means of transport, to shops, to the place of work, and to such amenities as the neighbourhood can afford. It was the neglect of such considerations that helped to produce the hideousness of nineteenth century cities, and the sprawl of more recent ribbon development, and the spoiling of the countryside. The report of a study group of the Ministry of Town and Country Planning on " Site Plan- ning and Layout in Relation to Housing," should be read side by side with " Design and Dwellings." Here we come to planning in the wider sense of the term. Yet we cannot in practice separate the one problem from the other. When we are building houses we must build them somewhere,, and they will bear a certain relationship, planned or fortuitous, to the town, to industry, to the countryside. It is a 'natter of urgency to start with a proper con- ception of planning in the wider sense. It is well that we should have before us the excellent advice contained in this report— regarding the study of environment, the avoidance of central congestion, the preservation of green belts, the consideration of satellite towns, the planning of " neighbourhood units," the lay-out of roads, the grouping of houses, and the study of Ian scape effects. These, indeed, are matters to be considered if Britain of 197o, like the London of 1970 envisaged by Hamilton Kerr on another page, is to be more than an agreeab dream. They are matters to be considered by local authoriti but not local authorities only, for in many of these aspects transcend the local and even the regional. The Britain wh preservation and redevelopment we so earnestly look forward cannot become a reality without the establishment of a cen planning authority, with powers to create a master plan.
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