“Is Liverpool a town which has a considerable quantity of land which may be made available for the purpose of erecting houses?—There is a good deal of land in the suburbs.
“The corporation possess a good deal of land?—They do.
“Have you had under your consideration the provisions of what is called Lord Normanby’s Act, by which it is forbidden to build houses back to back?—Yes.
“What were the reasons which induced the Corporation of Liverpool not to object to houses being so built?—If houses were not to be built back to back there would be a great sacrifice of land.”
I do not bring this evidence forward to censure that corporation, but rather to excuse private persons in some measure, by showing the general unconcern and ignorance about the subject. It appears that even a corporate body, who might be expected to discern the value of public health and morals, and not to be subdued by the prospect of immediate and apparent gain, have at least not made any endeavour to introduce a good system of building cottages for the poor of their own town. Not that they, probably, were in the slightest degree, more mercenary than other men; but it is only an instance to show how little attention has hitherto been given to this subject.
There is at present in the metropolis, a Society for “improving the dwellings of the industrious classes;” but what is one society? This is a matter which ought to interest the owners of property, and the employers of labour, throughout the country. Such a society as the one named may do great good by building model houses, making scientific investigations, and frequently laying before the public information on the subject. But the proper division of labour, as it seems to me, would be that the state should give every legislative facility for contemplated improvements in the way of building, should encourage all researches into the subject, and be ready to enforce by law such regulations as, without any great intrusion upon private property, might secure for small houses those primary requisites without which it cannot be expected that they will be anything but nests of disease. In fact the state might, eventually, so order the matter that builders should not merely build such houses as the poor would take, for there is nothing in the way of a shelter which they will refuse to occupy, but such as ought to be let to them, with due care at least for the public health. The local authorities should take upon themselves, the lighting, cleansing, paving, supplying with water, and the like. For private individuals there remains the most important part of the task, namely, the building of an improved class of small houses. In this good work the employers of labour may be expected to come prominently forward. Many a man will speculate in all kinds of remote undertakings; and it will never occur to him that one of the most admirable uses to which he might put his spare capital, would be to provide fit dwelling places for the labouring population around him. He is not asked to build alms houses. On the contrary, let him take care to ensure, as far as he can, a good return for the outlay, in order to avoid what may, possibly, be an unjust interference with other men’s property; and also, and chiefly, that his building for the poor may not end in an isolated act of benevolence, but may indicate a mode of employing capital likely to be followed by others. In the present state of things, the rents of small houses are disproportionately high because of the difficulty and uncertainty of collecting the rents for them; but by any improvement you introduce into the habits of the occupiers of such houses, you make this difficulty and uncertainty less; and thereby diminish rents. And thus, in this case, as in many others, physical and moral improvement go on acting and reacting upon each other. It is likely, too, that these poor people will pay with readiness and punctuality even a higher rent, if it be for a really good tenement, than a small one for a place which they must inhabit in the midst of filth, discomfort, and disease, and therefore with carelessness and penury. Besides; the rents they pay now, will be found, I believe, sufficient to reimburse the capitalist for an outlay which would suffice to build tenements of a superior description to the present ones.