HOUSING, ABERDEEN. (Hansard, 12 April 1933)

§ Mr. BURNETT
I wish to raise a matter of which I have given notice to the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland. It concerns 906 tenants who have received notice of termination of their tenancies within 40 days for failing to fill in a form asking for particulars as to their income. I brought it up by question and answer, and I was informed by my hon. Friend that the matter was one that did not concern his Department but was a question for local management, administration and control. But it seems to me that the question has a wider application. The action of the town council was taken on circular 51, issued by the Scottish Board of Health, of which the Under-Secretary is the representative in Parliament and, therefore, I feel that it is a matter that ought to be raised in the House. I do not at all sympathise with the view that a person of means ought to live cheaply in a subsidised house. At the same time, two questions of principle are involved in the matter. The first is whether this circular intends that local authorities should give notice of termination of lease to sitting tenants simply on the ground that they have failed to fill in a form giving particulars as to their 2711 income. The second is perhaps a wider one, the point as to whether it is intended in the circular that particulars of a rise or fall in income should be taken into consideration in considering increases or decreases of rent or whether rent should just be assessed according to the quality of the accommodation that is given.
The other large town councils have fought shy of this circular in its major part and have applied it only to new applicants for houses, in which case matters will go on more or less as they have done in the past and inquiries will be made when new tenants apply for houses. Aberdeen went further than that. It took the bull by the horns. In the case of the tenants of all the corporation houses, both Addison houses and early 1924 houses—the houses which were more highly rented—forms were sent out asking for full particulars of income. Something like 1,650 families were involved. The houses were erected after the War when building materials were dear and when wages were high. It was found that the rent to be charged was entirely beyond the purse of the ordinary working man. The result was that the houses would have stood empty if it had not been that there were others willing to take them. The rents of the houses in Aberdeen vary from £22 to £32 a year, rates vary from £7 to £7 10s. on occupiers, and from the outlying parts where those houses have been built the omnibus fares amount to about £8 a year. It is admitted that a wage-earner is able to spend about one-fifth of his income on rent. That means that those houses are really out of the reach of anyone who has not an income of £200 or £250 a year.
Those forms were sent out with questions as to income. The natural conclusion at which all those 1,650 tenants arrived was that they were to be put out of their houses at a time when alternative house accommodation of the kind was not available in the city. It was natural that they should band themselves together. Meetings were held in the various housing colonies when it was decided unanimously that the questionnaire should not be filled up. The Town Council met and by a vote of 18 to 17, two members being absent, it was decided to send 40 days' notice to all tenants who failed to fill up those forms. The notices were sent out at once. My hon. Friend has 2712 referred to the fact that the notices were accompanied by other notices offering certain alternatives such as a new tenancy on completion of form at a higher rent. These other notices followed a day later, which is quite a different thing. I should like to join issue on the point as to whether the circular justifies the fixing of the increasing or decreasing of rent according to the rise or fall of a tenant's income. It is very difficult to know how far we can go if we adopt that principle. As a landlord I might go to a tenant and say, "You have had a rise of 10s. a week. You are to receive notice to quit your house in 40 days." I could then go back to him next day and say, "As long as you give me 2s. a week extra for rent you may stay on," but I do not think that public opinion would support the action I was taking. The town council has to act as a model landlord. Take the case of a subsidised house. A man might go to the council and say, "I was earning £2 10s. a week at the time I took the house, I am now out of work and have 25s. 3d. It is your duty to reduce my rent by one-half." When a person goes into a butcher's shop he does not expect the butcher to ask him what his income is and to charge him more for his meat if his income is high. Therefore, the principle sought to be applied is wrong.
In this case the tenants are not getting more than the value for the houses in which they are living. These houses are not equal to similarly rented pre-war houses or similarly rented houses which are being built now. I was on the town council and on the housing committee, and I know how many complaints there were about these houses. At one time there were complaints as to dampness in these houses, and inquiries were made about them. I myself visited some of the houses and I saw mattresses rotting, clothes mildewed, damp coming down the walls and paper falling off. We were told that it was condensation but I do not think that anyone who went into those houses and saw the conditions would believe that was all. The town council saw what the conditions were, and decided to spend a considerable sum of money in trying to make the houses wind-and-water tight.
The tenants have now been presented with the alternative of buying houses or 2713 building houses. If they can build, so much the better for housing generally, but there are few people, even with incomes of from £250 to £300 a year who in these precarious days, when—even if they had the money, which they generally have not—they might lose their jobs, would like to invest it in houses, because they might find themselves out of employment in a short time. These Addison houses, these early houses, have done good service for housing generally, even if in certain cases families with high incomes have got into them. Occupation of each of these houses has meant vacating another house. It has meant an additional house which a wage earner has been able to get. That is a very important point in connection with these houses and I would ask the Under-Secretary to regard the matter sympathetically. There is a responsibility on the Department in connection with the circular.
The town council is taking a course which I do not think has very much precedent to support it. It is not supported by public opinion or, I think, generally. I have heard of one precedent in the case of Manchester where five years ago they sent out to their tenants a questionnaire similar to this. The tenants refused to answer it and received notice. The cases are more or less identical. The Manchester City Council found itself powerless to enforce what they had sent out. I hope the Department will consider the advisability of slightly moderating, if possible, or withdrawing the circular, for I assure the Under-Secretary that there is real disquiet and real feeling on the subject. Therefore I hope he will regard the matter sympathetically.

§ Mr. MAXTON
I am not from Aberdeen and my interest is in the general question. I intervened at Question Time, when the hon. Member for North Aberdeen (Mr. Burnett) raised the matter, and I do not want to walk into it to-night in order to protect Aberdeen, which is reputed throughout Scotland to be able to look after itself. I merely want to ask the Under-Secretary a question which he did not answer satisfactorily at Question Time: Where does the statutory power arise which permits a town council to send questionnaires out to its citizens, 2714 and to impose penalties upon them if they decline to fill up those questionnaires? This means test mind is becoming very widespread in Governmental circles. We are prepared to say that the Aberdeen town council has the right to put people out of houses if it does not want them in the houses. It has got that power. These are not controlled houses. They can put their tenants out if they like. But what right have they to make the refusal to fill up a questionnaire a ground for putting people out of their houses? I should like the Under-Secretary in his reply to refer to that matter.

§ The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for SCOTLAND (Mr. Skelton)
The hon. Member for North Aberdeen (Mr. Burnett) has raised a question which is a repetition of the question of the hon. Member for Bridgeton (Mr. Maxton). I dealt rather too shortly with his supplementary question. Let me begin my observations in the following way. The House has been made as familiar as I could make it with the policy of taking administrative steps to see that those who were enjoying subsidised houses were people whose means and whose position justified their occupation of those houses. In the Estimates of the Department of Health last year I mentioned it first; I referred to it again on the Second Reading of the Housing Bill last February. The House well knows that in the first place we asked a consultative council of the local authorities to deal with this very question. That I mentioned last year in my speech on the Estimates. They gave us a report which I referred to in the course of the Housing Debate and the Lovat Committee referred to the same matter. Both the Consultative Council of the Lovat Committee recommended that the system of means test should be applied to those who were enjoying the assistance of the State and of the local authority in occupying a subsidised house. The Consultative Council said that there were in Scotland between 5,000 and 10,000 houses which were probably occupied by persons whose means did not justify their occupation of those houses, and who could not properly be called members of the working class, to whom—as this House knows—all these Estimates have been directed.
2715 In view of the recommendation of our Consultative Committee of local authorities my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State directed the Department of Health to issue a circular drawing the attention of local authorities to the recommendation of the Consultative Council. Aberdeen has paid attention to the circular, and has dealt with it by means of a questionnaire. My right hon. Friend and I are absolutely satisfied that the time has come when an effort should be made to see that subsidised houses are occupied by people who deserve them from a financial point of view. Aberdeen, like many other local authorities in recent years, has been taking more detailed and definite steps to see that the applicants for new houses are suitable persons from that point of view. For the last two or three years a form has been issued to every applicant; there has been an investigation, and the result of that investigation has been before the town council in its allocation of houses.

§ Mr. BURNETT
That form was adopted five years ago, and ever since then it has been sent to tenants.

§ Mr. SKELTON
I should say five, not two or three years ago. It is therefore to houses which have been in occupation for more than five years that this remark applies. There were some 1,600 of these houses; a questionnaire was sent out and was accompanied by a letter saying that if the questionnaire was not answered, it would be taken that the tenant was agreeable to a rise of £5 per annum in the rent, and, if the questionnaire was answered, that a rent suitable to the information disclosed in the questionnaire would be fixed. Of the 1,500 tenants, 800 replied to the questionnaire, or more than half. My hon. Friend said that I had disclaimed all responsibility, or that it was no concern of the Department of Health. Far from it. The responsibility for the policy is the responsibility of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and myself, and I for one am glad to have had the opportunity of taking some part in introducing what is a most necessary reform with regard to the occupation of subsidised houses.

§ Sir S. CRIPPS
Reactionary.

§ Mr. SKELTON
Anything that means that the right people get into the right 2716 places is regarded as reactionary by my hon. and learned Friend. The right people in this case are the working classes and people whose incomes justify the occupancy of subsidised houses. I do not think there is any doubt about that. With regard to the particular action that was taken I make no comment. I cannot myself see any suitable alternative. But the action taken was in fact entirely under the control of the local authority because under the Housing Acts the general regulation, management and control of the houses is vested in the local authority. It cannot be said that to find the necessary information by way of a questionnaire was at all outwith their powers and duties. I can quite understand that at the first blush the tenants may have been made anxious by the fact that they had received notice to quit. The letter which accompanied it should have stilled their fears. But the House knows that a change in rent or tenancy can only be brought about by a formal notice to quit, of which one may say that its bark is worse than its bite. There is no other method of raising the questions of occupancy and rent. I have no doubt the tenants now realise the exact implications and function of the notice to quit, and I have little doubt that the matter will be settled and that the result of this action will be satisfactory to all concerned. It will be satisfactory to the State and the local authorities, because they will make certain that the tenants of the subsidised houses are suitable persons. It will be satisfactory to the tenants themselves, because they will know that they are suitable persons, and those whose means do not justify the present subsidised rents, will have the satisfaction of knowing that they have done something towards helping the State and the municipality in a time of great emergency. I am extremely glad that the circular addressed to the local authorities by my right hon. Friend has borne fruit. I am sure the House will be satisfied that this is a wise step, and I am certain that when this action is completed any feeling of anxiety which may have arisen will be dispelled.