DOWN WITH RENTS.

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2804, 23 June 1916, Page 6

DOWN WITH RENTS.

Sir,—ln your Monday's issue the subleader was devoted to the above subject. I hasten to thank you for the very fair and certainly way you criticise the proposal that Sir Joseph Ward has advocated in the Budget. In addition to your reasons why a Fair Bent Bill should be introduced, instead of putting the rent back to pre-war time, there is the,enormous 'increase in one branch of trade, tne plumbing. '■" Theso malerials are up to 100 per cent, in some things, wages to 10 percent.; this all charged to landlords for their repairs. Other tradesmen's charges have similarly risen, interest, too, has ' gone up. I had a mortgage which matured fourteen months back. It was renewed by : mc paying an. extra 1 per cent., making 6 per cent. This meant 103..'per week extra to pay. If affected seven fourroom and scullery cottages. They have gas, bath, copper, Tubs, etc, and are ten feet apart. They were 145., now 15s. per week; situated in Newtown. Surely, the landlords are entitled to .raise rents 10, per cent, since the war started. This should be the limit in a fair rent book, or a minimum.—l am, etc., ' FAIR-'RENT. June 21, 191 G.