Annual report on the health, sanitary condition, etc., etc., of the Royal Borough of Kensington for the year 1901.

  • Kensington (London, England). Royal Borough.
Date:
[1902]
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: Annual report on the health, sanitary condition, etc., etc., of the Royal Borough of Kensington for the year 1901. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    125/133 (page 127)
    127 space and upwards, which would not be illegally overcrowded with five adults, or two adults (parents) and six children under 12. The rooms are crowded—people and furniture being taken into account—and obviously such a mode of occupancy is undesirable, and incompatible with comfort, not to say decency. Of cases of overcrowding, judged by the standard of the by-laws, it is so far satisfactory to be able to report that few were found. Generally, it was a question of one child too many. The death of a child would abate overcrowding; the birth of a child create overcrowding. A case was noted of a family, comprising the parents and a two-year old child, occupying a room containing 1,200 cubic feet, or 200 feet more than the by-law exacts. The mother gave birth to twins, and overcrowding was thus brought about, the space required for the family being now 1,400 cubic feet. Had Nature been less bountiful, the room would have provided exactly the space required for the four persons = 3 adults. In about a dozen cases nocturnal overcrowding was brought about by misuse of space as when, for example, all the members of a family slept in one room, another room being used by day only. Judged by the Registrar-General's standard of two persons (irrespective of age) to a room (irrespective of size), the cases of overcrowding in one-room tenements were 553; in two-room tenements, 417; in three-room tenements, 82; in tenements of four or more rooms, practically none. Cases of illegal overcrowding (i.e., cases where less space was provided than required by the Council's by-laws) were brought to the attention of your Committee at successive meetings, when necessary, and proceedings in such cases were taken, by written intimation or statutory notice, for the abatement of the nuisance. A few cases of indecent occupation (eight in all; seven of them in one street) were observed; cases where more than two persons of different sex above the age of 12 were in occupation of the same sleeping room : an offence under the third by-law (Separation of the Sexes), but not an offence of which the sanitary authority can take cognizance (in the absence of overcrowding) in houses not registered. Generally, however, these cases were of the less objectionable kind; as when a boy or girl over 12 occupied the same sleeping room with the parents. These cases, likewise, were brought to the attention of your Committee, in ordinary course, when they occurred in registered houses. It may be mentioned that only 214 empty rooms (= 3.1 per cent. of all visited) were observed. The large number of 564 tenements (nearly 16 per cent.) contained a single lodger to each. Very few and unobjectionable cases of subletting by lodgers or tenementers came under observation. The general results of the inquiry are summed up in Addendum B, page 130. [It is not within the reference, but it may nevertheless be interesting to state that advantage was taken of the occasion to investigate the sanitary condition of the 905 houses (6,925 rooms) visited, and that defects were observed as follows :— Cases. In connection with W.C.'s 86 „ Cisterns 37 ,, Roofs 38 ,, Yards 14 ,, Ashpits 28 General 214 Total 417 The several nuisances, etc., were reported to your Committee, and abatement notices served. The nuisances and structural defects observed, relatively to the number of houses, were greatest in the Notting Dale Special Area, North-West Sanitary District.] The information in Addendum B on the subject of rent of tenements relates exclusively to unfurnished rooms. It is interesting as showing what a large percentage of the earnings of the working classes goes in this way. The rent per tenement naturally varies much according to the size and position of rooms; basement and slip rooms fetching less than rooms on the ground, first, and second floors: front rooms more than back rooms. It cannot be said that the rents are always proportional to the quality of the accommodation: quite otherwise in many cases. The most striking illustrations of high rents were observed in the Special Area, and particularly with respect to furnished rooms in tenemented houses. Cases could be cited of houses worth, perhaps, twelve to fifteen shillings a week unfurnished, let in furnished rooms so as to bring in thirty, forty, and, in a few cases, even fifty shillings a week. The rent per tenement for a single room ranges from 3s. to 7s. 6d. per week; for two rooms from 7s. 6d. to 10s. 6d. The furniture, for the most part, is meagre in quantity ; in quality wretched, and hardly deserving the name. With few exceptions the furnished rooms are found in the Special Area; in which district the unfurnished tenements of one room fetch from 1s. 6d. to 4s., the two-room tenements from 4s. 6d. to 7s., the three-room tenements from 5s. 6d. to 10s per week,