And a couple of years later the Chief Sanitary Inspector submitted to his Vestry a report on some so-called “model dwellings”: “These blocks of buildings, 50 feet high, are packed together so as to exclude light and air, and four rooms occupy the site of two: evil conditions which the architect and owner were not only privileged to create, but also, and very practically, in so doing were they privileged to condemn unborn generations of people, whose necessities condemn them to live in these tenements, to endure the evils of their creation.”
The Medical Officer of Health for St. James’ wrote:—
“Block dwellings in such an area as St. James’ do not provide the conditions in which healthy children can be reared, nor in which there can be a family life comparable with that possible in the open suburbs of London.”
The Medical Officer of Health for St. Olave gave a description of Barnham Buildings:—
“Many of the rooms, &c., on the ground and first floor are generally very dark, and the buildings have not been maintained in a sanitary condition, notwithstanding the hundreds of notices that have been served the past five years. The average death-rate of the past five years of the unhealthy tenements was at least 49·6 per 1,000 and of the remainder at least 29·1.”
The Medical Officer of Health for St. Marylebone gave an interesting explanation of the condition of this class of houses:—
“The following is a list of applications, under the Customs and Inland Revenue Act, 1891, from which it will be gathered that it is quite exceptional for a block of artizans’ dwellings of even recent construction to be in a tolerable sanitary condition. The reason for this anomalous state of things is, that in the building of these dwellings the Sanitary Authority seems to have no power; a dwelling must be occupied before it comes under supervision.”
In spite of these and many other drawbacks, however, many of these buildings afforded accommodation far superior to that which had previously existed on the spots where they were erected, and provided residence for large numbers of people who otherwise might have been doomed to living in the worst class of tenement-house.
Closely connected with the Public Health Act of 1891 was another Act passed in the same year—“The Factory and Workshop Act.”
The Select Committee of the House of Lords on the Sweating System had finished their inquiry and reported in 1890. The evidence given before it was, as regarded factories, workshops, and workplaces, very much a repetition of that which for thirty-five years had been detailed by Medical Officers of Health as regarded the dwellings of the people, but now obtaining greater publicity attracted more attention.