HOTEL, BUXTON (SQUATTERS) (Hansard, 2 November 1949)

§ Mr. Molson (The High Peak)
For two and a half years I have been trying, by persuasion, to obtain for Buxton the abatement of a nuisance which has been becoming increasingly a danger to public health. I have repeatedly warned the Government Departments responsible that disease would certainly ensue sooner or later, and last August I was asked to attend an inquest regarding the death of a baby in the Empire Hotel. The jury at that inquest found that the death of that baby was, to a greater or less extent, due to the appalling conditions in which the squatters in that hotel were living. I therefore think it my duty to raise this matter so as to give the Government an opportunity to explain how it is that, after three years, this danger to public health continues.
This hotel, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, was requisitioned by the War Office 10 years ago. It is still held by them. When, at the end of the war, they ceased to use the hotel, they negligently allowed the squatters to enter. It was in December, 1946, that the Buxton Corporation first drew the attention of the War Office to the scandal of these squatters. It was in the following July that my attention was drawn to them, when the War Office made a somewhat casual attempt to obtain vacant possession of the hotel, and I was asked to go there to see a pregnant woman who was expecting a baby in three or four days, and was likely to be removed to a neighbouring workhouse.
I then saw the living conditions of these squatters, which has remained much the same from that day to this. Because the Corporation does not provide—and I think that in law it would not be allowed to provide—light or water, the conditions in which the 90 or 100 people are living are indescribably filthy. Sewage exudes from broken pipes on the outside of the building, and is falling down the walls. The areas in front of the hotel are heaped with waste which has been pumped away at intervals of six months, first, by German prisoners of war, sent by the War Office, and later by 554 British soldiers. One will appreciate that, in those circumstances, during the long and hot summer, the stench has been particularly obnoxious to those who have the misfortune to live down wind. Conditions there are much the same as they were three years ago. The blame in the first instance rests on the War Office, because that is the Government Department which holds this building under requisition. Immense damage has been done to the building and in that connection, I have seen casual passers-by pulling down railings and carrying them away, apparently for firewood. I cannot congratulate the War Office upon the efficiency it has shown, even in the way in which it conducts its correspondence.
This matter, as I have said, goes back to 14th September, 1947, when the right hon. Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Bellenger) was Secretary of State for War; I then wrote and complained to him that the letters which I was receiving from Lord Corvedale, and the hon. Member for Leith (Mr. Hoy), Parliamentary Private Secretaries, were not consistent; he wrote on 18th September, 1947, saying that they did their best to link up letters with earlier correspondence, but stating that Lord Corvedale's letter should not be construed as an acceptance of responsibility by the War Office for what was going on. Later, I received a letter saying that my letter of an earlier date had not been brought to his notice.
No progress has been made because as recently as 20th October this year the present Secretary of State for War wrote saying that it was quite out of the question for the Army to send someone to inspect the place with a representative of the Ministry of Health also with the assistance of the local medical officer of health. In fact, and strangely enough, Western Command had already sent an officer, who inspected the hotel in company with the Medical Officer of Health; that was what the right hon. Gentleman said was impracticable. Furthermore, the War Office tried at an early stage to put this on to Buxton Corporation. On 2nd September, 1947, Lord Corvedale wrote saying: I understand that immediate action can, and I think should be taken by the local authorities who, under the Public Health Acts, have full power to initiate proceedings against 555 any persons causing a nuisance with a view to forcing them to abate such a nuisance. I wrote to the Minister of Health who refused to accept responsibility, but who associated himself with our view of the complete impracticability of the suggestion of the War Office. On 24th September, 1947, a letter from the Ministry of Health said it was agreed that the powers of Buxton Corporation did not afford a very practical method of dealing with the existing unsatisfactory conditions. Shortly after that the War Office then made an attempt to pass the buck to the right hon. and learned Solicitor-General. On 14th May, 1948, the Financial Secretary wrote and said this had become very largely a matter for the Solicitor-General, and added, "Perhaps you will get in touch with Soskice." I proceeded to do so and the right hon. and learned Gentleman said he was sorry not to have written an official letter but he was waiting for official information. By that time, the War Office had taken the matter back in their own hands and called a further meeting in London. I have summarised my complaint against the War Office, that for 10 years they have been responsible for this building, that they have allowed this dangerous nuisance to be created, and that their efforts to deal with the situation have not been conspicious for efficiency.
I now come to the difficulties the War Office have had in obtaining possession. For some reason or other, the Treasury solicitor decided to apply to the High Court instead of to the county court, and for some incredible reason the High Court judge required alternative accommodation to be provided for the squatters. In view of the fact that these were trespassers, I do not know why alternative accommodation should be provided. I cannot believe, if the real character of these squatters had been brought to the attention of the High Court, that the decision would have been given. In several cases these squatters have already been evicted from Buxton Corporation houses.
I turn my attention from the Financial Secretary of the War Office to the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health. Naturally, when we found that the War Office were not able to get these squatters out of the hotel without providing alternative accommodation, the 556 Buxton Corporation and I made appeals to the Minister of Health and his Department to help us in the matter. On 11th June, 1948, a meeting was held at the Ministry of Health, at which there were present representatives of the Ministry of Health, the War Office and the local authority. At this meeting it was proposed that the Buxton Housing Committee should act as agents of the Ministry of Health in respect of the huts to be erected to accommodate the squatters. I was asked to use my influence with the Corporation, such as it is, to accept that suggestion, and they did so.
It will be appreciated that this was a courageous decision on the part of the Buxton Corporation. It was in some degree an invitation to other people to go in and "squat" in the hope of obtaining the alternative accommodation then provided, and naturally it caused a certain amount of resentment among homeless people in Buxton when it appeared that these squatters would be able to "jump the queue."
On 5th January, 1949, the Town Clerk wrote to me saying: As you are aware, there is a proposal on foot to provide a site and the military authorities were going to provide the huts for erection on the site. I am afraid I am at a dead end as far as consent to this scheme is concerned. He included a letter from the Ministry of Town and Country Planning, in which they stated they regretted that they were not in a position to answer his letters of 22nd November and 2nd December—the Ministry of Town and Country Planning were not yet in a position to give a final decision. Since six months had elapsed when the Government Department concerned had come to a decision, I put a Question to the Minister of Health on 20th January. I asked: whether he is aware that, although in accordance with the advice contained in his departmental letter NW/935/717A/2/2 dated 2nd November, 1948, application was duly made by the Buxton Corporation both to his Department and to the Regional Planning Officer for authority to rehouse on the Lad Manlow site the squatters in the Empire Hotel, no answer has been received from either Department; and what action he proposes to take. To which he replied: I regret the delay in dealing with this difficult case and I am taking steps to clear it up as quickly as possible."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 20th January, 1949; Vol. 460, c. 310–11.] 557 As a result of his intervention on 29th January, the Regional Officer of the Ministry of Health wrote to the Town Clerk and said: The letter from this Department suggesting that agreement to the use of the site for that purpose should be obtained from the Regional Planning Officer was sent under a misapprehension, and I have therefore to request that the submission to the Planning Officer be withdrawn. Correspondence is in progress between this Department and the War Office with a view to obtaining the early use of suitable land, and as soon as possible a further communication will be forwarded to you. I wrote to the right hon. Gentleman on the 8th February and I had only an acknowledgment of my letter and on 25th February, therefore, I wrote asking him to receive a deputation. Obtaining no satisfaction, on 2nd March, 1949, I saw two senior officials of the Ministry of Health. I saw the Financial Secretary to the War Office. I saw the Quartering Officer at the War Office and then I saw the Minister of Health himself in his room in this Palace at four o'clock that afternoon, and I had a telephone conversation with the Treasury Solicitor in the evening.
I was promised that everything would be done and I thought that at long last something would be done. On 9th June, the Buxton Corporation wrote to the Secretary of State for War, asking him to take some further action in the matter, and because I had discovered that the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for War gives very little attention to this matter, I myself wrote to the Financial Secretary. I received nothing except a civil acknowledgment. On 28th July, just before the House rose, I arranged to see the Minister of Health and went over with him carefully, a letter I had received on the subject from the Buxton Corporation and he promised to send me a reasoned reply in a week or two. For that reply, I am still waiting three months later.
It has been proposed that a site known as Silverlands should be used because this is requisitioned property and contains a camp, but this site was bought before the war by the Derbyshire County Council for a new police station, and work upon it is due to begin within the next two-three weeks. The Ministry of Health are, therefore, confronting Buxton Corporation with a most difficult dilemma. If 558 they are to free their town from the scandal and the danger of these squatters in the Empire Hotel, they are required to go back upon an understanding with the County Council to provide a site for a most necessary and long overdue police station.
I am glad to say that on Thursday of last week, we had a further conference at the Ministry of Health, at which the Treasury Solicitor made a suggestion, which may possibly bring this scandal to an end, if the courts grant the relief to the War Office which will be asked. But the responsibility of these two Government Departments for this long-continuing scandal is really indisputable and is a cause of very great resentment to the Corporation and to the people of Buxton.
The Minister of Health has left unanswered my personal and urgent letter of 28th July. No satisfaction has been obtained from a petition to the Prime Minister signed by the 12 clergy and ministers of the Borough of Buxton who are concerned not only with the danger to the health of the people of Buxton, but also with the danger to their moral welfare. I, therefore, consider the time has come when one should say what the people of Buxton feel about the lack of action by the two Government Departments concerned, and I shall be interested to hear anything that the Minister has to say in reply.

§ The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health (Mr. Blenkinsop)
I can very well understand the feelings both of the hon. Gentleman, the Member for The High Peak (Mr. Molson), and of the Council at Buxton about this most unhappy position that has been existing at the Empire Hotel in Buxton for so long. I am anxious, first, to make it clear as far as the Ministry of Health is concerned, and indeed as far as the War Office itself is concerned, that we have been trying to deal with this problem, and to help in dealing with it for a much longer period than the hon. Gentleman suggests. It was, as far as I can understand the position, on 11th October, 1946, that a meeting was held between representatives of my Ministry, the War Office and the Buxton Council to see what could be done with the situation that was then existing, when there were only three families squatting in these premises. It was then 559 agreed that a recommendation should be put forward to the Buxton Council that if they could offer alternative accommodation on the Silverlands Camp part of which they already occupied and managed, then the War Office on their side would secure the hotel against further entry.
Unfortunately, when the Mayor and the other members who were present at that meeting put these proposals forward to the Council at that time the Council agreed, as they were perfectly entitled to do, that they could not adopt this suggestion because they had their own homeless people to deal with, and felt it would be wrong to give priority to those who were in the hotel. In view of subsequent developments it may be a matter of regret that that decision was taken then. All through the Ministry of Health has tried to assist the local authorities in dealing with this matter, but I should make it clear that the Ministry itself is not the housing authority. It can only do what it can to help the housing authority to find that accommodation, which we had hoped would assist the War Office in their efforts to secure the ejection of the squatters. Continuous efforts have been made by the regional officers of the housing office staff of my Ministry to help in dealing with this problem, not only to help the local authorities to find suitable alternative accommodation, but also in trying to find institutional accommodation if other accommodation was not available.
It is true that the War Office have been making a series of efforts to secure the ejection of the squatters by approaches to the courts, not once but on several occasions, but the decision of the courts has turned on the question of what, if any, alternative accommodation is available. I have some sympathy with the point raised by the hon. Gentleman as to why it should be necessary to offer alternative accommodation, but that was the ruling of the court, and naturally we were anxious to do all that we could to help the local authority in their efforts to find such accommodation. The hon. Gentleman refers to a conference held in London on 11th June, 1948. But that was merely one of many conferences which have been held among the interested parties in this very unfortunate and difficult matter. The agreement 560 then was that huts to be provided by the War Office would be erected on the Silverlands Camp, and that when additional accommodation was available on the camp site it would enable us to offer alternative accommodation to secure the ejection of the squatters from the hotel. This project fell through because, in fact, it became evident later on that the land that was proposed to be used was not, in fact, available for this purpose as was at first imagined, but in the ownership of the Territorial Association, who, I understand, refused permission for the huts to be put on the site.
Then the local authority were asked whether they had any alternative sites. Discussions took place not only with the local authority again, but with the War Office, who did what they could to find some alternative site on which huts could be put, but the Council were not at that time able to put forward any alternative proposals, particularly having in mind the fact that if they were to enter into a lease of land very naturally Exchequer grants would not be available for it, a point which I think the hon. Member quite understood. The position now is, as he has stated, that new proceedings are being taken which we hope will result in the ejection of the squatters without alternative accommodation being offered in order to—

§ Mr. Molson
Is the hon. Gentleman going to deal with the withdrawal of the Lad Manlow letter, which seemed to result from my unfortunate Parliamentary Question to his right hon. Friend.

§ Mr. Blenkinsop
On that my information is that he was referring to what developed from the conference held on 11th June. As I understood it, the agreement at that conference was that it was the Silverlands site that should be used, and it was only when proposals about that site fell through that other sites were suggested. I understood that the position was that the local authority did not feel able to come forward with certain proposals they had about leasing other land, because there would be no more grant available from Exchequer funds.
In any case, as I see the position, it is most important that we should clear up this situation as rapidly as possible. The solicitors, I understand, are taking fresh proceedings, which will, we hope, result in the ejection of the squatters, and 561 my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for War has given his pledge that he will do his utmost on his side to ensure the protection of the property as soon as the squatters have been ejected, and its derequisitioning as rapidly as possible.
In case there is still any question of alternative accommodation being required, the Ministry of Health felt that it was only right that we should hold on to and refuse derequisitioning of the Silverlands camp site in order that there should be no slipping up this time in the ejection proceedings, but I believe that the Buxton Council just recently suggested the possibility of another alternative site, which, in their view, would be preferable to the Silverlands camp site. Whichever way that goes, clearly the only point in which we are interested is that the ejection should take place, and that if it proves to be necessary to offer alternative accommodation then either the Silverlands camp or some other alternative site should be made available for it.
The hon. Gentleman has raised the question of correspondence he has had. As far as I am aware the only recent correspondence we have had with him about which, at the moment, I have information was a reply sent to him on 6th September of this year after he had discussed this problem in the Ministry and had asked for an early reply, which was sent to him on the day following his visit. He also wrote to my right hon. Friend on 7th October referring to the request of the Buxton Town Council to have a deputation received, and that was not replied to, I believe, until 22nd October, although it was acknowledged. That was because in the meantime our regional officers were making inquiries of the Buxton Town Council to ask whether they had any fresh proposals to make. 562 As our regional officers had been in touch throughout the proceedings with the town council they very naturally wanted to know whether there were any further matters that could be raised to make a deputation to London valuable. That was the only reason for the delay in that particular case.
I shall certainly look into the question of the delay in replying to the letter that the hon. Gentleman tells me he addressed to my right hon. Friend on 28th July, because we would certainly not wish to appear discourteous in this matter. What is more, throughout the whole of these proceedings, which have been long and difficult, may I say both for my own Ministry and the War Office, that the efforts continuously of our officers have been to try to find a solution of what was, of course, an extremely difficult problem. Indeed, as far as the Ministry of Health is concerned our regional officers and our staff in London have exceeded their strict duties—as indeed we would wish them to do—in trying throughout this matter to find some solution of the problem acceptable to the council which would really secure the ends we both have in mind. I am in agreement with the hon. Gentleman in hoping that the proposals now put forward will secure a speedy solution. He can be assured of our anxiety to achieve that end.