[Report 1948] / Medical Officer of Health, Edinburgh City.

  • Edinburgh (Scotland). City Council.
Date:
1948
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1948] / Medical Officer of Health, Edinburgh City. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    143/274 (page 135)
    HOUSING. Clearance Areas. There have been no clearance areas promoted during the past year and no indication has been given as to when this necessary work will be recommenced. Whole streets of houses which were considered to be ready for inclusion in clearance areas in 1938 are still used for human habitation. Every endeavour is made by this Department to encourage the owners to keep the houses in repair, but many of the sanitary defects are beyond repair and the demolition of the buildings and clearance of the site is the only solution. If it were possible to proceed in this way many valuable sites could be made available for rehousing purposes within reasonable distance from the centre of the City. It is realised, however, that the rehousing of families from these unfit houses at the present time would cause further congestion in the waiting list of persons requiring housing accommodation, but it should be possible to make a start in a small way now and gradually speed things up to the rate of progress attained in 1938. It should be borne in mind that the preliminary work in the promotion of a clearance area or redevelopment area may take from twelve to eighteen months. Individual Unfit Houses. During the year Demolition Orders in terms of Section 16 of the Housing (Scotland) Act, 1930, were passed on 8 houses. The internal woodwork of these houses had reached a serious state of decay from wood-worm, and along with inherent sanitary defects, such as dampness and lack of sufficient sanitary conveniences, the property was considered to be beyond repair. In 45 other instances the owners gave voluntary undertakings that the houses would not be relet for human habitation in the event of the occupiers obtaining other accommodation. The House-letting Department rehoused 13 families from unfit houses during the year. Overcrowding. Requests from overcrowded families for certificates on their behalf to be submitted to the House-letting Department totalled 4,107. This is an increase of 696 over the previous year and the highest number since 1938. On the other hand, by the efforts of the House-letting Department, it was possible to obtain the removal of 1,733 families from overcrowded houses or overcrowded sub-let rooms to Corporation houses. This is more than double the number rehoused in 1947 and 575 more than the previous highest total over a period of 10 years. Report on Survey of Housing Conditions. The Report on the survey carried out in 1946 has now been published. The arranging and supervision of the survey and preparation of the Report were done by the Sanitary Department.