D.—l

Work was commenced in the Grey River on the placing of additional stone protection on right bank near Coal Creek. Damage to protection works at Raupo Returned Soldiers' Settlement was repaired. On the Poerua River, right bank below State highway, a stop-bank was cut and heavy flooding occurred in the vicinity of Ilari Hari. Protective work carried out included the closing of stop-bank and the building of a groyne in the river. Numerous other repair works were carried out on South Westland rivers. At Karamea a considerable amount of work was carried out on the Karamea and Little Wanganni Rivers following the exceptional flood of a year ago. A bulldozer was employed in cleaning main channels of debris and shingle deposits. At three places on the right bank a layer of heavy stone was placed to arrest severe threat of bank erosion. Christchurch District. —In the Ashley River fairly heavy repairs to groynes have been necessary in addition to normal maintenance-works. A commencement was made by the Waimakariri River Trust with heavy clearing and light stop-banking of 11 miles of the Eyre and Cust \Rivers. In the Ashburton River heavy clearing of willows in the main channels has continued during the year, and has already had a beneficial effect on both flood-flow and in deepening the river-bed. Heavy maintenance was undertaken preparatory to the handing-over of the work to the local authority. Dunedin District —On the Clutha River heavy stone work for bank-protection was continued on the lines of previous year's work, and has proved very satisfactory. Improvements to Lee Creek in the Taieri River Trusts area were continued. Signed on behalf of the Soil Conservation and Rivers Control Council. W. L. Newnham, M.lnst.C.E., Chairman. APPENDIX G ANNUAL REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR OF HOUSING CONSTRUCTION The Director of Housing Construction to the Hon. the Minister of Works Sir, — I have the honour to submit the following report on the Department's activities for the year ended 31st March, 1944 : — (1) Building Construction. —Owing to the restrictions necessarily imposed upon the Department's activities as a consequence of war conditions, it was necessary to make available for dcfence works practically all of the man-power of the Housing Construction Department and to control drastically all private and unessential building work not directly connected with the war, effort. With the tapering-off in the defence programme towards the end of last year, new and suspended housing contracts have been commenced by the various contractors and the housing programme has been greatly accelerated, although the transition stage has been greatly hampered due to the shortage of material and man-power. As a means of finding ways of increasing house-production, reducing cost, and relieving the demand on timber-supplies, the Department has erected or is erecting a number of experimental houses. Generally the experiments fall under three headings : — (1) Prefabricated wood units : (2) Prefabricated concrete units : (3) Concrete in situ and block units. In regard to prefabrication generally, care has been taken to avoid the lowering of standards of construction or effecting a mass-production appearance to the finished houses. From earlier experiments carried out on the use of prefabricated wood units the Department is now constructing the bulk-of the wood houses in Wellington and Auckland on a modified prefabrication system. This system is in conformity with the New Zealand Standards Institute Model Building Code requirements. However, in view of the many suggestions and ideas that this Department has received on prefabrication, further experimental buildings are to be erected.

16