568729-1929-Supplementary-Draft-Bill---Public-Health-and-Buildings-Amendment — Page 4

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upon a street has still to be provided for. The two sections in the principal Ordinance as amended by this Ordinance will deal with this special case by giving discretion to the Building Authority, but this discre- tion is carefully limited in the interests of the building owner by the provision that in the case of a building which does not abut upon a street, but is built on land abutting upon a street, the Building Authority shall have no power to require such building to be of a less height than if it abutted upon the street.

4. Two of the provisions to be inserted at the end of section 188 of the principal Ordinance deal with the special cases of buildings on corner sites and buildings on sites abutting upon more than one street.

5. The third proviso to be inserted at the end of section 188 of the principal Ordinance lays down that the height of a building shall not be regulated by the width of any scavenging lane, or other lane, or open space, upon which such building may abut, if such lane or open space is not to be used as a means of access to some domestic building (other than servants quar- ters).

4. Paragraph (5) of section 188 of the principal Ordinance provides that no domestic building shall exceed four storeys in height, including the ground storey. Storey is defined in section 6 (53) of the prin- cipal Ordinance as meaning a space which has a height of at least 9 feet. Attempts are sometimes made to evade section 188 (5) by making a ground floor of about 8 feet in height. This floor is not technically a storey and the practical result is that the house is five storeys high, using storey in the non-technical sense. This of course leads to overcrowding. An attempt is made in this Ordinance to check this evasion by provi- ding that for the purpose of section 188 (5) a storey shall include any space having a clear height of more than 5 feet. This will still allow the provision of a basement. It may be mentioned that paragraph (5) of section 188 of the principal Ordinance is now to become paragraph (6).

7. The paragraph repealed by paragraph (b) of section 4 of this Ordinance is repealed because it is spent.

:

23rd November, 1939.

J. H. KEMP,

Attorney General.