P.), Miss
Constance Cochrane, Alderman Thompson, and others, were first discussed
at a preliminary private meeting in December, and then submitted to the
Conference, which was held on March 1st, the day following the
Conference at which the Labour Party was established. By choosing this
date we secured a large number of delegates from Trade Unions, and these
were reinforced by numerous delegates from Vestries and other local
authorities, altogether numbering about 400. At the close of the
proceedings a National Committee was formed with headquarters at the
Fabian Office, which had however only a short career. The Conference
papers were printed as a bulky penny tract, "The House Famine and How to
Relieve It," which rapidly went through two editions. We also published
"Cottage Plans and Common Sense," by Raymond Unwin, which describes how
cottages should be built--an anticipation of garden suburbs and
town-planning--and a compilation of everything which Parish Councils had
done and could do, including housing, prepared by Sidney Webb and
called "Five Years' Fruits of the Parish Councils Act," which in 1908
was revised and reissued as "Parish Councils and Village Life." A speech
by W.C. Steadman, M.P., who was a member of the Society, was printed
under the title "Overcrowding and Its Remedy." Our agitation was not
without results. The amending Acts of 1900, 1903, and 1909 have done
much to remove the unnecessary administrative complexities of the Act of
1890, but in fact the problem is still unsolved, and the scandalous
character of our housing, both urban and rural, remains perhaps the
blackest blot in the record of British civilisation.
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