HC Deb 27 October 1920 vol 133 cc1728-9
57. Mr. A. M. SAMUEL

asked whether houses provided under the Housing Act at an approximate cost of £900 are being let at approximately £35 per annum instead of at an economic rental of approximately £72 per annum; whether such houses let at £35 per annum pay rates based upon assessments having relation to the subsidised rentals paid, and not to rentals based upon economic cost; if so, whether ratepayers occupying non-subsidised premises are subsidising the occupiers of premises let at non-economic rents in that the occupiers of subsidised premises are enjoying all the benefits provided by the total rates for the locality, but are not paying their share towards them proportionate to the economic cost of the premises provided under the Housing Act at rentals representing less than half the actual cost for interest and sinking fund on the money expended to provide such premises; and whether such a state of things indirectly throws upon a section of the general body of ratepayers a burden for the benefit of the occupiers of subsidised houses, which operates on ratepayers not enjoying the subsidised rentals, by indirect effect, as an excess of what they pay in the form of the penny local rate limited by the Act, and consequently constitutes an additional and sectional burden by means of local rates beyond the burden imposed under the Housing Act by Imperial taxation?

Dr. ADDISON

The hon. Member is, I think, under some misapprehension. The rents of the new houses are not like the rents of the old houses, protected by the Increase of Rent Act, and the object of Parliament in inserting the provision as to rating of new houses in Section 12 (9) of that Act was to secure that so long as the rents, and consequently the assessments, of the old houses are artificially, restricted, the occupiers of the new houses should not be unfairly rated by reason of such restriction.

Mr. SAMUEL

May I ask my right hon. Friend whether, when 100,000 new provided houses have been built, costing approximately £100,000,000, the assessment of these houses will be based upon the rental paid or upon the economic value; if these houses are assessed on the rental value—

Mr. SPEAKER

I should like to see that question on the Paper.