HOUSING.

Taranaki Daily News, 26 August 1920, Page 5

HOUSING.

NEW PLYMOUTH SCARCITY, WHAT IS GOVERNMENT DOING? DIFFIODLT TO GET TENDERS. (By Wire.—Parliamentary Reporter.) Wellington, Last Night. Questions about the Government's schemes for housing under the control of the Labor Department- were asked by Mr. S. G. Smith in the House to-day. Mr. Smith asked the Minister, for Labor (Sir William Herries) what the result had been of the calls for tenders for building homes throughout the Dominion, the tenders having closed on the 16th of the present month. He was especially anxious to know regarding New Plymouth, where the housing conditions of a number of people could be properly described as deplorable. The old drill hall, which had been sheltering several families, had now been sold "by the Deefnce Department, and these people would have to get out, .ahd they had nowhere to, go. He wished to know whether the Housing Department had any scheme for the erection of houses in the town of New Plymouth, where houses were so badly required. Mr. Massey: Has the Council built any?

Mr. Smith said that the number of houses, built by private persons during the last year had been 111 in excess of the number for the previous year. The had obtained a loan of £ 10,000, and was pushing on with the building of homes. It had also made application for another loan of £IO,OOO for the same purpose. The Council and the local bodies had done their utmost, he said, to meet the difficulties. The Minister said that he had no* at hand, the full report regarding» the tenders' received, so that helicould ao* say what the position regarding New Plymouth was. He had been-informed by the department that the tenders had been unsatisfactory, and that in a great many of the centres no tenders had been offered at all. It was now a question whether the department would not be wiser to do the work itself. If no tenders had been received from New Plymouth it was possible that this course would be followed by the department there.