HOUSING OF THE POOR.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXII, Issue 8883, 7 August 1907, Page 2

HOUSING OF THE POOR.

(For Press Association.) ■Wellington, August G. The Board of Benevolent Trustees today discussed the report, of its special committee on bousing recipients of relief, which recommended restrictions on people who will nut keep their tenements clean, also the purchase of laud in the city on which to erect bouses for the poor. Mr London, who presented the report and moved its adoption, replied to criticisms levelled at the amateurishness of the provisions in the report, and claimed that the Trustees wore the right people to deal with the question. Mr Hogg thought the trustees would bo exceeding their duties in undertaking suchhvorlr, which should he left to thq police and local authorities. Air D. Robertson agreed with Mr Hogg, and hold the opinion that whore there was poverty there was dirt. The trustees would need a big inspectorial staff under the new scheme.

Mr Wakeham also agreed with the two previous speakers that it was not the function of the trustees to house the destitute. Mr Cook was also opposed to the report. Mrs D.arvnll thought the principle of providing fit housing for the poor to a certain extent was good and would prove economical in management.

The chairman (Rev. W. A. Evans) spoke strongly in support of tho recommendations in the report. It was one of tho functions of the trustees not only to keep people from starving but to provide them with a good environment for the growing children who were at present frightfully handicapped. In replying, Mr London thought tho recommendation, that tho trustees should buy up a slum quarter, was a very good one. The motion that the report bo adopted was lost on the voices.