THE SLUMS OF WESTMINSTER •
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—In reference to your article in last week's Spectator on the Joint Report of the Westminster Housing and Public Health Committee, may I comment very briefly upon tha statement that one penny in the pound on the rates would inflict hardship on the poorer working-class tenants ?
Let us suppose, for argument's sake, that a typical eight- roomed tenement house in a poor-class street in Westminster is rated at the extraordinarily high figure of £60. (In St. Pancras it would be from £25 to £30.) One penny in the £ on £60 is 5s. a year. Suppose there are three tenants in the house (there are more likely to be four), they will pay is. 8d. a year each, or two-fifths of a penny a week, in their rent. It is unlikely that the rateable assessment of the house will be anything like as much as £60. The poorer working-class tenants will pay from id. or less to id. a week for this rate, Does the Westminster Council really mean that the infliction of this hardship is one of the chief reasons why it fails to levy the penny housing rate ?--I am, Sir, &e.,
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