The Daily News. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 25, 1911. WORKERS' HOMES.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 132, 25 November 1911, Page 4

The Daily News. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 25, 1911. WORKERS' HOMES.

hi ninety per cent, of the cases of (listless coming before charitable bodies in New Zealand the chief bug-bear of the distressed ones (apart from sickness) is "rent." The average worker in the course of his life pays enough money in rental to buy several houses. The price of land in urban and suburban areas in Xew Zealand is usually greater than the price obtainable for land in London, Manchester, Glasgow or Dublin. The handicap a worker has in obtaining a home of his own is instanced in Xew Plymouth, where at this moment for quarter-acre sections is •demanded up to £400! The huge prices for mere "handkerchief" sections in most urban and suburban areas in Xew Zealand are generally the result of booming by the "get-rich-quick" brigade. The Government entered into the field to supply houses to workers at a time when building-site land was priced at many times its real value, and this was its only excuse for doing so. The Government says it can build a six-roomed house for a worker anywhere in Xew Zealand for £460. and that all charges will cost the tenant lGs a week, by payment of which he will become the owner. When the Minister of Lands laid the foundation stone of a series of workers' homes at Sydenham the other day, he said:

The Covcrnmeiit had now introduced a scheme wherein- a man oould Imv his | house on a deposit of .tin. Under the old scheme IST homes had been erected | nt Addington, Auckland, Dimedin and ! Wellington, hut the new scheme would extend beyond the four centres and apply to any part of the Dominion. At the same lime there was still a dillicuHy ill fretting land that would run out at a fair price per section —say from .C,)O to even tSO or X.W— and it was useless to rounder sections that cost up to ,U1.1I). 'The scheme hail many advantages. There were no plans to lie paid for. no procuration fees for getting the money, and the worker knew from the start exactly what he had to pay. The worker could nominate from a two to a sixroomed house, choosing from fifteen different designs, and improvements would he made if desired. Nothing but the best material would he used, and the Department would turn out a house that would lie ample security for the money it cost. There had been a proposal that ready-made hou-cs should lie purchased. but nothing of the kind would he done, as it was intended to put the workerinto faithfullv-iitiiß houses that would not require repairs for years to come. The success of the scheme was assured. The Department had accepted tenders

for 22 buildings at Auckland, 23 at Wellington, 11 at Palmerston North, 11 at Sydenham, and. two at Addington, and 'had purchased land at Napier, Wangamii, Hamilton, Taumarunui, Timaru, Teraukit and Dunedin, and he hoped before long to find the country studded with workers' homes. /The eleven flections at Sydenham had cost £B9ft, and the contract was £4241. The two sections at Addington had cost fIOI and the contract was £4241. The two sections at Addington had cost £l9l and the contract was £837, so the average worked out at £470 a house.

If the Government scheme expands as it deserves to do, it will have a valuable effect on citizens and citizenship. The family which lives in certain possession of its home is the best possible kind of family for a town. It is interested in all that makes for the progress and beauty of the town, and it has the prido in the home that is impossible to the occupier of a rented dwelling. The intention of the Government to build workers' dwellings under its scheme, soundly and of good material, suggests that such a dwelling should be the <■ :>mpulsory standard of privately erected dwellings. An honestly constructed dwelling (intended for renting) is a rarity in the Dominion, and it is a rarity because of the supineness of local authorities. We are aware that it is inevitable that every- town in New Zealand must in time be reconstructed and that the usual ramshackle apologies for habitations simply represent a phase in our progress as a people, but any means taken by the Government or by local bodies to increase the number of homes possessed by their occupants is good, and any means of fighting the slums that already exist in all parts of New Zealand will result in national benefit.