Abstract
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title> <jats:p>This book is a social history of Northern Ireland before the Troubles. It is about housing corruption in 1950s Belfast. It focuses in on working-class female ‘fixers’ and their equally working-class clients, their activities giving rise to the Belfast Corporation Housing Corruption Inquiry of 1953–4. It was the longest public inquiry to have taken place since the establishment of Northern Ireland in 1921. Together with the attendant Head-Constable-led police investigation, it lasted ten months, culminating in full court proceedings, held in public in the legendary Crumlin Road Courthouse. The rich archival sources generated by the inquiry provide a remarkable insight into the working poor in Belfast in the immediate aftermath of World War II.</jats:p>