Urban problems

Artisans Dwellings Act – 1875

• Gave councils greater powers to deal with slums – condemning whole areas
• Could buy up whole district and have houses pulled down, erecting new ones in their place

But:

• Not compulsory legislation – could if they wished, but did not have to

BUILDING SOCIETIES

• By 1906, helped to finance construction of nearly 50,000 homes in Cheshire and Lancashire alone

MUNICIPAL HOUSING

• Artisans Dwellings Act – 1875 – gave all local authorities power to pull down slums

But

• Progress very slow

The Report of the Royal Commission on Housing -1884-85

• Proved that problems of slum housing weren’t being solved
• In some ways – getting worse
• Provided evidence of appalling character of slums

The Housing of the Working Classes Act - 1870

• Allowed (non compulsory) town councils to force erection of new houses in place of unsanitary buildings
• Like council housing - beginning
• Progress still too slow
• London population grew by over a million in same period

PRIVATE BENEVOLENCE

George Peabody

• Wealthy American
• Came to live in England, set up Peabody Trust
• He gave £500,000 towards it
• Trust built blocks of Peabody dwellings, first opened in 1864
• Built total of 50,000 flats to rent

Octavia Hill

• Daughter of notable reformer
• 1864 – brought three cottages in Marylebone
• Spent own money on improving them
• Let them out at rent high enough to repay money she’d already spent
• Her success encouraged her to buy up other slum property persuading rich friends to lend her money

Private benevolence – Octavia Hill’s work was of some value.

BUT

• She and other private benefactors had succeeded in rehousing only 26,000 – all in London
• P.B didn’t come to grips with real housing problems of ever larger industrial towns

MODEL HOUSING ESTATES BUILT BY FACTORY OWNERS

Some built housing estates:

• Sir. Titus Salt – Saltaire
• Completed in 1871
• Healthy housing, amenities around – parks, libraries, museums

• W.H Lever’s Port Sunlight – 1885 - soap

• Bournville – George Cadbury – 1895 - chocolate

Each of these model housing estates influenced others

GARDEN CITIES AND TOWN PLANNING

1898 – Ebenezer Howard 

• Called on government to follow examples of Lever, Cadbury and Salt
• Planning building of new towns

1902 – Published a book under title “Garden cities of tomorrow”

• Showed that planned garden city could have advantages of both town and country
• Avoid disadvantages of both
• Combines energetic and active town life with beauty and delight of country, eliminating bad points

1903 – First garden city founded at Letchworth

• Then another at Hampstead

Some politicians and civil servants took up his ideas

One result of this:

1909 – Town Planning Act

• Gave local councils the right to insist that new housing estates had to be properly laid out
• Held out hope that industrial towns would one day be fit for humans to live in

HOUSING IN THE 21st CENTURY

During the First World War, 1914 – 1918, house building virtually ceased.

• Government passed Rent Restriction Act to stop landlords making huge increases in rent
• Became part of government policy until 1979
• Estimated at start of war that more than half a million houses were needed for people still living in dreadful conditions
• By end of war, housing shortage even more acute
• Even though government promised “homes fit for heroes”, people still living in insanitary, overcrowded homes

Most of the concern was with large towns.

 BUT:

• Many villages had bad conditions
• Without piped water or mains drainage until after World War II
• Cottages had earth floors – very damp

COUNCIL HOUSING - ACTS

1919 – Addison Act

• Dr Addison, Minisiter of Health
• Brought an act – gave power to build municipal housing
• Required them to do so
• Gave them incentive
• Incentive – government subsidy, to enable them to build badly needed new houses

New policy on housing:

• Subsiding the cost of building good quality municipal housing
• Could be rented cheaply to poorer members of society
• Without subsidies, people on poverty line would not be able to rent anything other than worst slum

Accepted new homes should be built with:

• Piped water

• Flush lavatory
• Kitchen
• Bath

Over 200,000 homes were built under provision of Addison Act - regarded as a success.

BUT:

• Abandoned at time of public expenditure cuts in 1922

1923 – Chamberlain Act

• Neville Chamberlain
• Provided different type of subsidy
• Led to building of more than 400,000 homes
• Most by private builders

1924 – Wheatley Act

• Objective of building 2.5 million houses in 15 years
• Let at rents which average worker could easily afford
• Increased the amount of Government subsidy paid on each house
• But only for local authority housing
• Half a million council houses built as a result of this act

BUT

STILL NOT ENOUGH

Council houses:

• Decent
• Low-cost
• Very good value for money

BUT

• Dull
• Dreary
• Basic
• Large estates – crime etc.

NOW LEARN – TWO SIDES BEFORE BACK ON PUBLIC HEALTH PAMPHLET

PUBLIC HEALTH -Pamphlet

The problem:

• Really appeared in the first half of the 19th C.
• Because of industrial revolution and agricultural revolution
• Living conditions deteriorated
• No Government planning (planning permission also)
• Government policy was “laissez faire” – leave them to do it

1) Living conditions improved

2) Population grew rapidly

3) Towns grew rapidly

4. Towns became overcrowded
5. Living conditions deteriorated

Disease:

1.)

• Typhoid fever
• Dysentery
• Cholera
• All spread when people consumed drinking water or food contaminated with the excreta of people suffering from these diseases
• Water borne diseases

2.)

• Typhus
• Infantile diarrhoea
• Carried by insects and other vermin that thrived among filth and rubbish
• One severe strain of typhus was carried around by body lice in people’s clothes and on bodies

3.)

• Tuberculosis
• Scarlet fever
• Whooping cough
• Measles
• Diphtheria
• Spread by coughing and sneezing

• People who lived in close contact with each other
• Suffered from malnutrition
• Recovering from another illness
• - Were particularly susceptible to catch these diseases

Cholera:

• New disease in England in the 19th century
• Particularly frightening – struck so suddenly
• Seemed to be no cure
• It first broke out in a number of big cities in 1831 (e.g Leeds)
• In some places it shocked the local authorities into action
• But they soon slipped back into bad old ways
• Many outbreaks in the 1850’s and 1860’s

Doctors:

• Showed great courage – many went to towns to study cholera and help where they could
• 1854 – Dr. John Snow proved there was a connection between pumps infected by sewage and cholera by plotting cases near Golden Square in London

3 FACTORS LED TO THE IMPROVEMENTS IN PUBLIC HEALTH:

• Disease and epidemics=shock=action
• Individuals
• Government legislation (acts)

• 1866 – An epidemic in London killed 6000 people
• During his work among the dying poor, Dr. Barnardo began his work for destitute children

But:

• Private effort could do very little
• Problem too great
• Continued to grow
• Resources of state needed for real progress

• 1835 – Municipal corporations Act
• Ratepayers could vote for counsellors to carry out improvements
• 1836 – Compulsory registration of births and deaths
• It now became possible to pinpoint black spots of public health

• 1838 – Serious outbreak of fever in Whitechapel, London
• Poor law commissioners instructed Dr. Kay Shuttleworth and Dr. Southwood Smith of Manchester to make a report
• LINK=epidemic--->report

Two factors finally caused the end of “laissez faire attitude” towards public health:

• Cholera - hitting ALL classes
• Chadwick and other philanthropists (concerned for others’ humanity) spotlighted problems

EDWIN CHADWICK

• Made secretary to Poor Law Board in 1834
• Involved in a number of enquiries into social problems
• When received report into Fever, he compiled 1842 - Report on the Sanitary Condition of the Labouring Population 
• Suggested whole series of public health reforms
• Argued that disease could be prevented by simple measures such as:
• Street cleaning
• Pure water
• Better sewage disposal
• Not a tactful man
• 1854 – Made to retire from the Board of Health
• 1858 – B. of Health abolished

1848 - PUBLIC HEALTH ACT 

• Chadwick’s Report was followed by another massive survey
• Survey prepared by Royal Commission
• Survey on the “Health of Large Towns and Populous Districts”
• This was published in 1844 and 1845
• Chadwick’s research and constant prompting resulted in the passing of the Public Health act in 1848
• This aroused considerable opposition
• Much opposition directed at Chadwick
• Some believed “sufferings” were Nature’s punishments
• In other words, poor got what they deserved 

The Public Health Act set up a General Board of Health in 1848:

• Chadwick one of the commissioners
• Together with Dr. Southwood Smith – one of the most influential and able members of medical profession at that time
• Also Lord Ashley – noted philanthropist

The General Board of Health:

• Supervised the setting up of local Boards of Health in towns
• Compulsory to set up a local board of health if death rate was more than 23 in every 1000
• OR if at least 10% of population demanded it
• Some towns readily compiled with the new regulations
• Some evaded its provisions (disadvantage of permissive legislation)

Local authorities that did establish Boards of Health:

• Were able to enforce a number of new regulations 
• SUCH AS all newly built houses should have proper drains and lavatories
• They could request that other houses be linked to a main sewer
• They could enforce
•  - adequate water supply 
•  - cleanse the streets
•  - organise refuse collections
• They could pay for the above improvements with the aid of a local pay rate
• They could introduce most of the improvements which Chadwick had recommended in his Report

DISADVANTAGES OF P.H ACT:

• Too weak
• Main principle permission rather than compulsion to act

BUT:

• Some of its achievements were very striking
• Town of Macclesfield
•  - reduced death rate from 42 per 1000 in 1847 to 26 per 1000 in 1858
• Many new towns installed effective earthenware sewers 
• And they improved their systems of water supply
• Sanitary inspectors helped to ensure minimum standards for many dwellings

 Reasons for the collapse of the Board of Health in 1858:

(Opposition)

• Chadwick’s personality – ANNOYED PEOPLE
• Board only had 3 PEOPLE ON IT
• Upper Class opposed it:
•  - a) Cost
•  - b) Poor got what they deserved
• Poor opposed it:
•  - a) Cost
•  - b) Invasion of their privacy and needs, liberty
•  Many Town Councils opposed it:
•  - a) If rates went up, they wouldn’t be voted back into office
• Landlords, owners of slum property opposed it:
•  - a) They had to pay out
• Water companies opposed:
•  - a) Had to pay for improvements
• Some people felt that Government were becoming too powerful and too interfering
• Losing their liberty
  

MAINS DRAINAGE

• Biggest undertaking was that of providing efficient sewage disposal for London

• 1855 – Metropolitan Board of Works given responsibility for sewage disposal in London
• Under direction of Joseph Bazalgette

• 1. Rivers flowing into Thames – 
• Were to be covered in and valves fitted
• To prevent tide flowing back up them

• 2. Two separate sewage schemes – 
• One for north, one for south
• Were to carry sewage to a point 22km below London Bridge
• There, sewage would be emptied at ebb tide so that it would be carried away

• 3. About 80km of brick lined sewers were built –
• But old sewers were gradually replaced by glazed stoneware ones made by Doulton in Chelsea
• These gave no seepage

• 4. The Thames embankment –
• Was built to narrow river
• To make it flow faster
• To scour the channel

• 5. By 1900 power processing plants had been installed near outfall stations to treat sewage with chemicals 

Key Dates -

Acts affecting Public Health:

• 1848 – Public Health Act
• Any town could have a Public Health Board if it wanted one or 1/10th of the ratepayers demanded it
• The Central Board of Health in London could force towns to have a Public Health Board
•  - Only if death rate was as high as 23 in every 1000
• The Boards had the power to set a rate for proper drainage - 
•  - Sewage disposal
•  - and for cleaning the streets

• 1854 – Chadwick and the Public Health Board had persuaded 182 towns to set up boards

• 1854 – Public Health Board closed down

• 1855 – Board of Health set up again with John Simon at its head

• 1864 – Factory Act forced employers to guard against unhealthy conditions in factories such as lack of ventilation 

• 1866 – Sanitary Act. Every town had to have Sanitary Inspectors with powers to order landlords to stop overcrowding and to remove health hazards from their properties

• 1869 – Royal Commission revealed bad conditions

• 1875 – An Adulteration of Food Act – stopped tampering with food

1875 – PUBLIC HEALTH ACT of 1875 – 

• Allowed authorities to pull down slums
• There had to be a Public Health committee in every district
• They had to provide water -  
• - Get rid of sewage
•  - Inspect food and markets
•  - Clear away rubbish
•  - and put a stop to unhealthy conditions in work places
• Towns had to have a Health Inspector & a Sanitary Officer
• COMPULSORY LEGISLATION

THE PUBLIC HEALTH ACT OF 1875 WAS A LANDMARK.

• It laid pattern, approach, principles of Public Health for the next 50 years
• i.e the state was responsible for Public Health throughout the country
• Improvements and reforms were to be uniform throughout the country

The 1875 Public Health Act:

• Gave further teeth to these developments
• It wielded all of the existing laws on public health into one major new law

ITS MAIN PROVISIONS WERE AS FOLLOWS:

• All Local Authorities HAD to appoint a Medical Officer of Health
• In the past they had the OPTION to do so if they wished
• Liverpool appointed its first medical officer as early as 1847

• The local authorities were made responsible for the organisation of:
• Refuse Collection
• Mains Sewers and drains
• Water supply
• And Public Health

• They HAD to ensure that all new homes had:
• Piped water supply
• Adequate sanitation with good drains and lavatories (not necessarily flush toilets)

In the same year, the Artisans Dwellings Act gave local authorities the power to pull down slums and erect houses in their place 

SUM UP OF PUBLIC HEALTH

• Public Health began to improve everywhere
• There was an increase in life expectancy
• The final achievement of Chadwick’s aim – i.e. that all towns should be fit to live in