Certified Houses Since the War, and especially in the last
few years, private houses at cheap prices have been built at an unprecedented rate. There are still too few of them, but, what is eqUally important, they arc not always of good quality. The jerry-builder has flourished during the building boom, and to a man of small or moderate means it is a disaster to find that he has invested his savings in a house badly constructed out of poor materials. Without technical knowledge, he is at the mercy of the jerry-builder and acquires not an investment but a liability for life. At a luncheon last week, the National Federation of Building Trades Employers, with the support of architects and of the Ministry of Health, inaugurated the National House Builder's Registration Council, which will administer a scheme to improve the standard of house building and keep it at a level set by the builders themselves. The council will draw up a minimum standard specification for ordinary houses, register builders who undertake to conform to this specification, and certify houses built in accordance with it ; anyone who invests in such a house may be assured, without technical knowledge, that it is built by good workmanship and with sound material. It is to be hoped also that a certain standard of taste and design will be observed.
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