ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with the administrative superstructure devised for the housing campaign, and looks in detail at the instructions on housing design issued to local authorities by Whitehall. At the top of the new organisation stood the Housing Department of the Ministry of Health. This consisted of the Housing Department inherited from the Ministry's predecessor, the Local Government Board, augmented by staff from other divisions of the ministry and by a number of temporary senior posts. Such a liberal attitude on the part of Whitehall was, however, entirely uncharacteristic and thereafter local authorities building under the 1919 Act were required to conform with both the letter and the spirit of Whitehall's views on housing standards and design. Under the procedure instituted for the housing programme of 1919, layout plans had to be prepared by the local authority and approved by the ministry before house plans could be considered for approval, let alone put out to tender and placed in contracts.
