26

THE  HOUSING  QUESTION

gave  the  farmer  a  double  hold  over  his  man.  Not
only  could  he,  if  the  latter  proved  idle  or  unruly,  turn
him  out  of  his  job,  but  he  could  also  deprive  him  of  his
home  as  well.  With  two-fold  chains  the  labourers
were  held.
After  taking  counsel,  therefore.  Dr.  Addison  in  his
Manual  of  State-Aided  Houses,  issued  early  in  1919,
and  in  memoranda  to  his  Staff  and  to  Local  Authorities,
directed  that  the  sites  for  the  new  subsidised  houses
in  the  rural  areas  were  to  be  chosen  in  villages  or
assembled  in  new  communities,  instead  of  being
placed  on  the  farms.  Not  only  for  the  reasons  of
liberty,  to  which  we  have  alluded,  but  for  this  reason
also,  that  where  the  house  is  remote  from  a  village,
although  the  breadwinner  is  near  his  work,  the  housewife ­
  becomes  a  lonely  woman  and  has  far  to  go  for
shopping  and  neighbours.  The  children,  too,  have
long  walks  to  and  from  school,  and  in  bad  weather
have  to  be  kept  at  home  ;  whereas,  if  the  house  is  built
near  to  others,  the  mother  and  children  gain  very  greatly
and  the  bread-winner,  if  he  has  a  bicycle,  need  lose
comparatively  little  time  to  get  to  work.  And,  in  any
case,  he  is  only  one,  and  the  strongest,  and  he,  too,
gains  through  security  of  tenure  and  access  to  society.
For,  if  the  subsidised  cottage,  owned  by  the  local
Council,  were  built  on  the  farm,  then,  although  the
man’s  dismissal  from  his  work  would  not  automatically
eject  him  from  his  home,  yet  practically  it  would  have
that  result,  since  a  house  on  a  farm,  where  he  could
not  work,  would  be  little  use  to  him.