To-day I asked the Minister for Local Government and Public Health if he has intimated to the Council of Municipal Councils that the decision to pay subsidies on houses costing up to £350 will only operate as from September 15 last and, if so, if he is aware how urban councils will be penalised who have been building continuously from the commencement of the increase in building costs, up to the date above mentioned. In reply, the Minister stated that the answer to the first part of the question was in the affirmative and said that he did not agree that there were any grounds for the suggestion contained in the latter part of the question. For the past 12 or 14, or perhaps 15, months local authorities have been making representations to the Minister in connection with this very important matter of house building. Not alone have they been making representations as individual bodies, but also through the medium of the Council of Municipal Councils, that the subsidy which was paid by the Minister and his Department on houses costing up to £300 was not sufficient because of the fact that the cost of building had increased enormously.
The Minister will remember that, well over 12 months ago, a deputation from the Council of Municipal Councils waited upon him asking that he should in turn make representations to the Minister for Finance that the subsidy should be increased so that it could be paid on houses costing up to £350 in some areas, and £400 in others. I think that, at the time, the Minister was impressed by the case made by the deputation and he promised to try to get a speedy decision on the matter. In consequence of the fact that that deputation waited on the Minister, and that a certain report was brought back to the Council of Municipal Councils, which was in turn conveyed to the councils affiliated to that body, certain councils, I think I am right in saying, did not go on with certain building schemes which they had in contemplation. Others of them kept on continuously building and, I suggest, these people who built continuously during that period have suffered in consequence because if the Minister is only going to pay an increased subsidy on schemes which have been sanctioned since September 15, the councils which have been building for the past 18 months will suffer enormously.
The Minister has said that he does not see that there are any grounds for the suggestion that certain councils will be penalised. The Minister knows quite well that building costs have increased enormously during the past 18 months. I have made inquiries in many quarters and I find that the cost of building has very definitely increased by at least 25 per cent. If that be so, it means a big impost on councils who have been building during the past 15 or 18 months. It would mean an increase in rent on houses costing £375 as these houses, prior to the increase in building costs, could be built for £300. The new rents would range from 4/11 to 5/8. The Minister, in the course of an answer to a supplementary question to-day, reminded me that the Government were paying a large subsidy. I admitted at the time that that was quite correct, but I said that the local authorities were also paying a large subsidy. To my mind, the subsidy that the local authorities are paying in a great many cases is, in proportion, just as great as the subsidy paid by the Government. In quite a number of provincial towns in the country, a three-roomed house is let at 3/- or 3/6 per week, while a fourroomed house is let at 4/- or 4/6 per week. If we take a house costing £375, with a subsidy only paid on £300, we find that the weekly charge on that house, assuming a valuation of £4 10s. with rates at 18/- in the £, and with depreciation, administration, etc., at 1 per cent., would be 7/-. As it has been the custom for municipalities to let these houses at 4/- or 4/6, these municipalities cannot change their policy immediately and let the same kind of house for 3/- a week higher than it had been let prior to the time that the cost of building was increased so that if a local authority, which has been building during the past year and a half, is not going to get the subsidy which the Minister is prepared to give on schemes sanctioned after September 15, it will cost that local authority £4 15s. 3d. per house per annum if the house is to be let at 4/- per week.
I suggest to the Minister, having regard to all the imposts put on by the Government at the present time, that that is a little too much to expect a municipality to meet. The Minister knows that ratepayers at the moment are being mulcted to a very large extent in consequence of Government policy. We know that in order to qualify for a grant for the relief of unemployment a certain amount of money must be put up locally. I am not grumbling about that, but the Minister knows that, when rates are increased, the people living in artisans' dwellings must bear their proportion of that increase. That fact in itself would be responsible for increasing the rent also. The concession given by the Minister, to my mind, is bluff, to a certain extent. Perhaps that may be too strong a word at the moment, but probably that concession was given in order to stave off certain local authorities from asking for certain things. The Minister and the officers in his Department know quite well that the Department will not be called upon to pay that subsidy on houses costing £350 until 18 months or two years have elapsed. He knows quite well that in any comparatively large scheme of building, which has been only sanctioned subsequent to the 15th September, the houses will not be ready for occupation until 18 months or two years hence, so that he is not doing anything at the moment to relieve the position in so far as the financial side of housing is concerned.
I do suggest to him, in order to encourage municipalities which had been continuously building for the past 12 months, that the least he should do would be to secure the permission of the Minister for Finance to pay a subsidy on houses which have been inhabited since the 15th September. I do not think that is asking too much. It will certainly place local authorities in a very invidious and peculiar position if the Minister does not now agree to my suggestion, because you will have houses in a town under a certain scheme being let at 4/- per week. Then you will have houses built during the last 18 months or two years let at 9d. or 10d. more per week, and then again you will have houses built under schemes that have been sanctioned subsequent to the 15th September which will be again let at perhaps 4/- a week or very near that figure. There you will have a situation where houses, of the same capacity and inhabited by persons of the same class, are let at different rents. I suggest it is too much to ask the local authority to pay £4 15s. 3d. per house per year in order that a man may get a house at 4/- per week. I suggest to the Minister that it is absolutely necessary that these houses should be kept at the one weekly rent. I believe that the Minister will see the wisdom of the case I am putting up. I think it should be quite clear to his Department and to himself that it is necessary that local authorities, who have had the courage to continue to build, even though costs were rapidly rising, should be given encouragement. The Minister and his Department, I am sure, are quite well aware that there have been municipalities which have refrained during the past 12 or 18 months from building because of the fact that they were confronted with very high building costs. Now they come in with the schemes to be sanctioned after the 15th September last, and they get the advantage of the Minister's increase in subsidy. I would ask the Minister himself to consider the position. I feel absolutely certain that, if he does, he will in turn make representations to the Minister for Finance asking him that this reasonable request of the municipal councils should be favourably considered.
