"Good homes to live in" — If you can afford them (1944)

From the July 1944 issue of the Socialist Standard

We are being told about all the marvellous inventions and improved equipment that will be used in new houses after the war.

  "Homes cleaned in a few seconds by the turn of a switch could be theirs after the war for the asking.”— Mr. it. Coppock Chairman of the L.C.C., News Chronicle, November 5th, 1943.)
   "Press the button and electrons will do housework.”— (Reynolds News, April 16th, 1944.)
    The Cabinet are planning "work for all and good homes to live in.”—(People, April 16th, 1944.)

Doubtless all these promised better houses are economically and technically possible, but, like most of the other marvels of our age, they will he available for the rich who can afford to pay. A foretaste of what the workers will get is contained in the following reports from the Daily Telegraph: —

  After two years the Government scheme for 3,000 farm workers’ cottages has produced one-third of the promised dwellings. . . . Many of the first 1,000 are not yet occupied. The reason for this is partly high rents.  . . . (Daily Telegraph, April ,18th).

And this: —

  Difficulty is being experienced in letting some of the Government’s new farm cottages in Lincolnshire now that they are ready for occupation.
    The Rev. P. A. Sharp, rector of the village of Thoresway, said at a meeting of Caistor Rural Council on Saturday that one of the features which were proving most unpopular with tenants was what he called the ridiculous size of the pantries which had been provided.
   "They are so small,” he said, "that you cannot stand up in them and stretch your arms out, and the wives of farm workers, accustomed to providing a good meal for their husbands, are calling them Woolton pantries. It may be all right to have a war-time pantry for war-time rations, but what. about after the war? ” —Daily Telegraph, April 17th, 1944).