“RED . POPLAR 
few possessions they have are of small value and realise little 
when taken, as they often are during periods of distress, 
to the local pawnbroker. There is, therefore, always a large 
percentage of the people dependent upon the Poor Law. In 
1905 the number was 11,344; in 1914 it was 7,144; and in 
1924 it had risen to 28,199. } 
As is usual in working-class districts, the housing in Poplar 
is shockingly bad. For the 37,288 families, which according to 
the Census (1921) were resident in the Borough, there were but 
23,064 separate dwellings, and of these over 20,000 were so small 
that they were rated at £19 or less. There were 11,648 houses 
which contained less than six rooms, whilst 10,479 were accupied 
by two families’ and another 1,799 sheltered three families or 
more. The usual standard of overcrowding recognised by the 
Ministry of Health is an average of more than two persons per 
room. This may not, at first, sound very bad, but when it is 
realised that four persons eating and sleeping, living and dying 
in two rooms are not, according to this standard, overcrowded, 
it is seen to be shamefully low. Yet 33;104 people in Poplar, 
or one in five of the population, exist under worse conditions 
than this. An average of three, four, and five per room is 
frequently found, whilst six, seven, and eight are not 
uncommon. 
Many of the houses are insanitary and in a terribly bad 
state of dis-repair. Built a hundred years or more ago, the 
fabric of a large number is worn out and quite beyond repair. 
Dark and dismal, damp and verminous, they are really unfitted 
for human habitation. Twelve districts have been scheduled as 
slum areas which can only be dealt with by pulling them down, 
whilst hundreds of houses not included in these areas can never 
be put into a really habitable state. 
Poverty and overcrowding bring disease and death, and 
thousands of Poplar people have been killed by preventable 
diseases, due to overcrowding brought about by slum-landlords 
and jerry-builders, who have used every power they possess to 
prevent the Public Health Authorities dealing with "the 
problem. In the years before the War the death-rate in Poplar 
was high, especially amongst infants. The average rate of 
infantile mortality in 1901-7 was 150 per thousand births. 
and in 1908-14 was 124. 
In Poplar, if anywhere, was a field for Labour activities; 
in Poplar, if anywhere, was there need for the workers to take 
control of Local Government and use it for their own better- 
ment; in Poplar, if anywhere, Labour has set to work 
vigorously to tackle social evils; and in Poplar, Labour has 
justified itself, as the following account will show.