Local Builders And State House Contracts

Chronicle (Levin), 20 July 1949, Page 4

Local Builders And State House Contracts

The" fear that the letting of State housmg coiitracts to outside bttiiders might ieave -ocal biiildefs high aiid dry in two years'' time; when perhaps housing cons.ruction vvould have reached sattiratioii point, was expresSed by Cr. R. S. Antcliff at a meeting of the LeViii Borough COuneii on Monddy night. Cr. Antcliff said he Was* not suggesting a slowing down on housing jonStfuction. when the Mayor, Mf. H. B. Bur'dekin, remafked that the position had been so desp'etate that ,he work could not be held tip, but • ,hat the position should be watdhed ind that .here should be a gfaddal oapering off in the Wdrk given to DUtside bui ders. "The position," said the Mayor, 'had been so unsatisf actory at the ;ime that We caded the buiidefs to^ether and offered to keep therh jusy on rehabi itation and State housing work. Out of all the locai ouiiders Only three had Offere'd to do work under State housing contracts. One of them had been iWo- years on one block and had to oe warned that the contract wou'd oe cancelled if it was not gone on witn!" The complaint of the local buiidsrs was the pin-pricking Which they had to put up with, said Cr. A. J. H. Allen. Many had foun'd themselves in the position of being financially embarrassed as a r'esutt of the methods used by the department in arranging payments. Mr. Burdekin: They get bimonthly payments now. Cr. R. A. Frederikson: The story is not all one way. The local builders have not been getting the deal that outside builders have had. I know of a case where a builder had hundreds of pouirds tied up in joinery work and could not get paid for it, or proceed, because of a shortage of another commodity. Mr. Burdekin: In that case it was held up because the "contractor himself wished to proceed in a certain material when ah alternative was available. Cr. Frederikson: The copncil is not competent to discuss this unless we have the full story from both the housing people and the builders. Mr. Burdekin: We are interested m the housing of our people, although I agree that this council has not ready the tight to discuss the matter of builders. The subjeet merely arose out of a reltiark passed by Cr. Antcliff. Many Waiting Hctises, Cr. Antcliff: I ain not criticising the past method use'd in ekpeditiiig the building of Sta e hotises, or suggesting that they be slowe'd Up. Speed them up by all means, but will the last two contracts not do for Levin. Mr. Burdekin: -No. There are 80 persons awaiting S';ate hoUses and in the two new blocks I think 'there are 22 houses in one and 33 in the other. We are betwixt and betWeen nere regarding commercial development. For instarice, many people have approached us to build factories here in the fUtUre atid we would welcome them, but we must reahse that they would probahly soon atsorb all our youhg labour. We have, therefore, got to ehcourage people to come here and stay here, so as to support fuiur'e industry. I have had an assurance that as soon as a worth while in-

dustry offers itself here, we will get conslderation for a f actory for it, pieferably in wood in view of the present shortages. Meanwhiie, we have reached the position where we will have to encourage all possible developnient to justify secondary industries here. That is why I would not like to see the building programme _ tapering off. Cr. Antcliff: Would commercial building absorb all local builders ' Mr. Burdekin: Yes. The system now is decentralisation. I may be wrong, of course, but that's what I think. , Cr. Allen: I will not say that the past methods have been wrong, but I thought that the work could hUVe been done by Ihe local men. Mr. Burdekin: We spent a whole day going round the builders. Three" were all we could get. We had reached a _dead-end. It was a erucial time in the towh's grdwfh.