PUBLIC HEALTH

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 67, 13 December 1918, Page 7

PUBLIC HEALTH

EFFECT OF NEW BILL

MORE WORK FOR LOCAL BODIES

"AN IMPOSSIBLE PIECE OF LEGISLATION"

The new Public Health Act, which is now law, is going to effect much that is desirable if all its provisions are found to be within tho bounds of possibility. One authority states that the Public Health Department has had for years power to do practically everything provided in the new Act. Take the provision dealing with unhealthy buildings, whieli reads :—

Upon the certificate of tho district health officer that any building or part of a building is in a condition unfit for occupation or dangerous, to public health, the local authority shall give notice to the owner to pull down the same.within the time named in the notice, not exceeding eight weeks. In lieu of requiring tho owner to pull down any insanitary building the district health officer may requiro .the owner to make structural alterations or ndditions to the building or improvements to the sanitary conditions. The owner of the building may appeal to a Magistrate. The decision of the Magistrate shall be final, and he shall make such order as to costs as he thinks fit.

Such power, the authority in question pointed, out, has always been vested in tho Public Health Department and exercised through tho local authority, in the case of AVelliiigton the City Council, and practically the same powor of appeal has always existed. There aro those who may remember the condemnation of a building on Lambton Quay by the council some years ago, but the used tile, resources of the law, and the building was repaired and stands on the Quay today. It. is well that the right of apN peal is provided for, as such a law may he acted upon arbitrarily.

A Big List. The lodginghouse provision, which necessitates the registration of all such places having over five lodgers, is an important one.. Presumably the provision means houses where people pay for board and lodging, as there may be other places where people lodge ijs friends, which are assumed to be free from the licensing law. The City Council is being given a Dig task, in January to register all such places, for Wellington is a city of boardanghouses, anil there must be many hundreds of houses used as lodginghouses.for more than, five, boarders. Such places must be registered.and a license issued before.February 1 next. This will give the Health Department officials and tho City. Council inspector n definite list to jvprk on, and in that manner every lodginghouse will be under surveillance. Tho City Coiulcil. is to. provide an inspector of such buildings 'according to the Act. At present the council has a building inspector, but his duties are of a structural character viewed from the standpoint of public safety, and .not as to the purpose for which'the buildings are intended. The new inspector's duties, however, are a great deal more comprehensive. The Act. says:— The local authority shall appoint a competent inspector of buildings, whose duty it shall bo to inspect every building. The inspector shall Teport to the local authority as to tho condition of every occupied building in the district, and in. particular as to; Area of land occupied and airspace, water supply, baths,'lavatories, ' sanitary and hygienic conditions, the name of the owner, the name and occupation of the occupier, the number and description of the . rooms, the number of persons' living in .-the building,- if rented tho vent payable, and such other information as may be ordered by the local authority.

Not Workable. "An impossible piece of legislation," is •how one civic authority described tho measure. "When I saw the. clauses about the Commuual kitchen and - communal hot-water system," he said, "I had to pinch myself to make quite sure I was not witnessing a pantomime. Tf ever there- was a measure conceived in panic it is this one; It is apparent right through that the Health Department is desirous of- making 'tho local authority' responsible for what Health Department officers should be responsible for. Take the law of inspection, and just notewhat duties are imposed on one inspector. One of his little jobs is 'to inspect every building' and 'report to the local authority as to the condition of every occupied building in the district, and in particular as to the area of land, air-space, etc' Why it would take au army of inspectors to do such work. The provision as to gaining information about rents is an obvious absurdity. It is an encroachment on a man's private business, just as much as it would be to ask a leading merchant what he pays for his goods. As a matter of fact the trend seems to be to discourage exactly that which the State and the council wish to encourage, viz., the building of good houses. What' man of any sense is going to build or iinproro his properties under the badgering restrictions, that are being placed on him?

It makes one look askance at house propisrty 'iid an investment. Picture Men Indignant, Mr. Henry llnywnrd, managing director of tho Now Zealand Picture Supplies, when seen by :i Dominion reporter reguiding the curtailment of the hours of picture theatres, stated that the provision which cuts down the hours to from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. and from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. was mi extremely serious one to the picture theatre proprietors, anil the wonder was that it was ever allowed to pass. "To cut clown our hours to half is inuictins a very, grave and unnecessarily severe .hardship on those providing a popular form of entertainment for the musscir at low rates of admission," said Jlr. Hay ward. "What a howl there would ho if the Government decided to cut down the hours ol the drapers' shops hv half without, consulting them, or ordered that on bargain sale dnvs the- premises were to bo closed for two hours iu. the middle oE the day in order, to freshen tile air. AY ell that is precisely what is being done to our business without any consultation, and in a. .fit of panic. It is true that our theatres are not as a rule crowded during tho morning session, but business is being done, then-after the theatre, has been empty for eleven or twelve hoursnnrf that without expense additional to what wo will-now have to bear.' "The provision - -iu the Act is so serious," said Mr. Hayward, "that wo cannot continue without raising our prices, for the business done before 2 p.m. and between 5 p.m. and 1 p.m. in tho cities just about represents our profit (if any)."