The Commissioners wish you however to consider whether any legislative measure in the nature of a Building Act (i. e. an Act prescribing certain rules to be followed in the building of cottages) would tend to introduce generally the improvements which may have been adopted partially by public-spirited persons in your district.
This may be considered:—
1. In the case of tenements intended for the residence of the labouring classes in towns;
2. In the case of cottage tenements in rural districts.
With regard to the former class of tenements, the wages of the labourers in towns being commonly double those earned in the rural districts, they may be well able to afford to procure such an increase of comfort in their houses as may be obtained by means of a Building Act, even at the cost of an additional rent. You are also requested, in your observations on this subject, to bear in mind another question, namely, the expediency of exempting small tenements from the payment of rates, or wherever rents are collected weekly, of collecting the rates from the landlord.
It has been stated that the exemption from poor’s rate tends to deteriorate the tenements of the labouring classes, inasmuch as many of such tenements are, for the purpose of obtaining the exemption, built of such quality and appearance as may bring them within the exempted class. It has been further stated, that the benefit of the exemption goes to the landlord, the rent for cottages built for letting in towns being very high as compared with rents obtained for other house property, and that such increased rents have been demanded expressly on the ground of exemption from rating. The causes affecting the construction of cottages are not expressly mentioned in the reports referred to in the resolution of the House of Lords, which treat chiefly of the external and immediately-removable causes of disease, such as stagnant pools or other out-door nuisances with which the parochial officers had to some extent been heretofore accustomed to interfere. But the defective construction of the cottages themselves, and the imperfect protection they may afford against cold or damp—the want of means for the due regulation of warmth or of conveniences for cleanliness, may often be the causes of the prevalence of disease; and the Commissioners consider not only that these subjects cannot with propriety be overlooked in any report on the sources of disease among the labouring classes, but that the beneficial moral results which may arise from the suggestion of improvements in the habitations of the labouring classes justify the Commissioners in taking this occasion to direct your attention to the heads of inquiry which are noticed in this communication.
Signed, by Order of the Board,
E. Chadwick, Secretary.
To
Assistant Poor Law Commissioner.