"The Building Act still works an independent course, and it is not too much to say of it that, whilst its provisions deal strictly with the strength and quality of bricks and mortar, they utterly fail to ensure for us dwellings, especially for the working classes, which have the least pretensions to perfection in sanitary conditions. A large number of habitations of this description have been completed and occupied during the last few years both in Fulham and Hammersmith, and take the place of our former fever dens in fostering disease. Unfortunately the Sanitary Authorities see these wretched structures raised before their eyes, and have no power to check their progress. It is truly to be hoped that this anomaly will soon be remedied."
Such as the houses were, however, they were quickly inhabited. The Medical Officer of Health for Paddington gives a graphic description of the result in his parish (1871):--
"There has been for some years a large influx of persons, mostly of the working class, coming from over-crowded and unwholesome houses of other districts of the metropolis. Large numbers of the newly-built houses being let out in tenements and single rooms attract a class of persons barely able to obtain necessaries of life; amongst these are not a few of intemperate and demoralised habits, with feeble vital stamina, consequently there is, and will be, a larger proportion of sickness, chronic pauperism, and death in the parish than formerly.
"This deterioration of race has for some time been recognised by Medical Officers of Health.
"It must be remembered that most of the working people are fixed to the spot, and cannot get a periodical change of climate, or remove from a locality in the event of impending ill-health, or of contagious disease breaking out near them.
"It is of no avail to lament over the laws of absolute necessity, but all parties should combine in a demand for that even-handed justice to the working ranks which, though it may not interfere with a stern destiny which confines them to a life of toil, is bound at least to provide that the theatre of that toil shall be free from the pollutions that endanger the functions of life, and uncontaminated by contagion and death.