page 10

Whites only in slums?

Salient Reporter

Whites Only is the rule in some Wellington slumhouses, Salient was told this week.

Alister Taylor, the 1965 association secretary who assisted the earlier NZ Truth investigation described on the front page of Salient 6, was commenting on the results of that investigation.

The lease of the house which featured in both the Truth features included a clause that no Maori, Islander, coloured person, or any descendant of these, could inhabit the house, Taylor told Salient.

The tenants supplied their copy of the lease, which was shown to the 1965 Truth reporter, Taylor said. However, the discriminatory clause was not mentioned in the subsequent Sunday News article.

Mr. Taylor also confirmed the remaining facts about the 1965 section of the story. In particular, he confirmed that the students who were in residence when the Sunday News story was written, were not the tenants when the flat was vacated.

At Right, decaying Wellington houses on the path which leads down to the flat featured in our last issue. (The flat itself is not in this picture.) Two of the three houses on the right are occupied, the unoccupied one (broken verandah) has recently been re-roofed.—Photo by Bob Sillis.