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SITY OF CALIFORNIA
LOS ANGELES
ENGLISH
LOCAL GOVERNMENT
DY
PERCY ASHLEY, M.A.
LINCOLN COLLEGE, OXFORD
I.K'TI :kek AT TUK LONDON SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS AND
POLITICA1 SCIENCE IN THE UNIVERSITY OK LONDON
' * . . * *
LONDON: T. C. & E. C. JACK
34 HENRIETTA STREET, 'U'.C.
AND KDINUUltfiH
1905
• •
The
Shilling Scientific Series
The following Vols, are now ready or in the Press :—
BALLOONS, AIRSHIPS, AND FLYING MACHINES.
By Gertrude Bacon.
MOTORS AND MOTORING. By Professor DARKY
Sl'OONER.
KADIUM. By Dr. IlAMPSON.
TELEGRAPHY WITH ANJ) WITHOUT WIRES. By
W. J. White.
ELECTRIC , LIGHTING., By .S.. P.. Waikkr, .B.N., •
•\.m.i.e.& ; ::;. : .: : ; \:\\
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.LOCAL. GOVERNMENT. By .«5R£*. Ashley; MtA.
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Others in Preparation '
Printed by Bam.antyne, Hanson &> Co.
At the Ballantyne Press
T
PREFATORY NOTE
in TnE purpose of this small volume is to provide
an elementary sketch of English local govern-
ment as it is at the present day ; and it is hoped
that it may be useful to the citizen who wishes
to know something about the organisation and
o
working of those local authorities on which his
comfort so much depends, and to the student as
T— I
cj an introduction to the larger and more elaborate
works set out in the Appendix. Necessarily
many details have been omitted, and many
matters dealt with briefly which deserved an
ampler treatment ; whilst the method of pre-
sentation adopted has necessitated some amount
of repetition.
C3
-X.
P. A.
June 20, 1905,
412741
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFATORY NOTE v
CHAP.
I. Introductory . . . . . ."• .7
II. The Areas and Authorities . . . .14
III. The Areas and Authorities (continued) . . 30
IV. The Central Authorities 43
V. Public Assistance 57
VI. Education 71
VII. Public Health 85
VIII. Public Health (continued) . . 96
IX. (I.) Transit. — (II.) Protection op Life and
Property Ill
X. Municipal Policy and Municipal Trading . 125
XI. Local Finance 140
XII. Local Finance (continued) 156
XIII. Local Authorities and (I.) the Leoislature,
(II.) the Courts op Justice .... 168
APPENDIX. A Brief Bibliography . . . .185
INDEX 188
vi
ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY
"Local government" means, in England, the dis-
charge by the inhabitants of a locality, generally
through elected representatives, of the powers and
duties within that area with which they have been
invested by Parliament, or which in rarer cases
devolve upon them at Common Law. In the
exercise of their responsibilities they may be left
altogether uncontrolled except by the legislature;
but more usually they are subjected to the autho-
rity of departments of the central government —
authority which varies in extent from the strictest
and most minute control to mere guidance and
suggestion.
The advantages of this division of the labour of
public administration between central and local
authorities are obvious. The tasks undertaken by
the modern state are so groat and various that the
attempt to accomplish them all by means of cen-
tral departments and professional officials alone is
doomed inevitably to failure ; all experience shows
thai sooner or later a breakdown is certain. More-
over, bo l'»ng as a uniform minimum of efficiency is
8 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
attained for the whole country, it is for many public
services desirable that varieties of local conditions,
desires, and needs should be considered ; and no
central department alone can have the requisite
knowledge for this, or be sure that its local pro-
fessional agents are not misleading it. That end
is best secured, and undue centralisation is avoided,
by allowing to the inhabitants of a locality, through
their elected representatives, as large a share as
possible in the conduct of public services ; and
this has the additional advantages that it arouses
local interest and gives to a considerable number of
persons some training in the conduct of affairs.
But it must not be forgotten that the work of all
authorities, central and local, is " state action,"
though we commonly use this term only for the
activities of the central government. There is no
difference in principle between central and local
action — the latter is only a particular branch of
the former, developed for the special reasons which
have been indicated.
If we exclude certain matters which are evidently
unsuited to decentralised administration, such as
the army, navy, and post-office, it is impossible to
make any lists of services which can and can not
be entrusted to local authorities. The practice of
civilised states differs greatly, because of differences
of purpose, of economic conditions, of social organi-
sation ; and Great Britain holds a unique position
among the states of Europe in respect to the amount
of work done and independence enjoyed by the
localities. Similarly it is idle to attempt to lay
down any general rules as to the amount of central
INTRODUCTORY 9
control advisable for decentralised services ; each
case must be considered separately, and even for one
and the same service the amount may vary from
time to time and from place to place. The aim
must be to secure a minimum standard of attain-
ment and efficiency, without diminishing local
initiative and interest ; and for this reason it may
in some instances be wiser merely to encourage
and guide action, instead of endeavouring to en-
force it.
The nineteenth century witnessed in England
a great increase of the functions of the state, and
an extraordinary development of local government.
The reform of Parliament reacted upon the whole
of national administration, and the great construc-
tive changes in the formation and powers of local
authorities followed close upon the extensions of
the parliamentary franchise. The first of these
movements was in the decade 1830-1840. The
Reform Act of 1832 was only part of a general
awakening ; it was followed rapidly by the first
parliamentary grant for National Education (1833),
the reorganisation of 'Poor Law administration
(1834), and of the Municipal Corporations (1835), and
the beginnings in 1838 of the demand for sanitary
legislation. This last, due in part to the action of
the Poor Law Commissioners, and in part to the
appearance in England of Asiatic cholera, was the
commencement of that ever-growing recognition
of the needs of national sanitation which was to
be one of the most potent causes of the develop-
ment of local authorities. The Reform Act of 1867
did not bring such sweeping changes in its train.
\
10 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
but it was followed by the erection, in 1870 of some-
thing approaching to a national system of education,
and by great improvements in sanitary adminis-
tration in 1872 and 1875. And meanwhile the
constant discovery of new administrative needs had
produced a great number of authorities of various
kinds, some with general powers and others autho-
rised to deal only with certain particular matters ;
and the piecemeal procedure of half a century had
resulted by 1888 in a " chaos of overlapping areas
and conflicting authorities. -11
The grant of the parliamentary franchise to the
agricultural labourers in 1884 brought, four years
later, the long-contemplated overthrow of the old
county administrative system, hitherto in the hands
of the Justices of the Peace alone, and the establish-
ment of elected county councils, followed in 1894
by the district and parish councils. The so-called
ad hoc system of independent authorities for
single purposes doubtless had advantages in some
cases, but the tendency at present (most strongly
marked by the recent abolition of school boards) is
towards the concentration of powers in the hands
of a small number of important bodies which be-
cause of the extent and variety of their functions
command general attention and interest. The
activity of the local authorities has constantly in-
creased, until there is scarcely any part of human
life which in some way or another they do not
touch; and although there is at present something
of an agitation against what is known as " muni-
cipal trading, 11 there is no likelihood that the
activity of our local administrators will as a whole
INTRODUCTORY 1 1
be curtailed — rather, everything points to further
and continuous growth. It is characteristic of the
English system that the legislature (unlike con-
tinental Parliaments) has never attempted to lay
down an arbitrary definition of the sphere of action
of local authorities not established solely for speci-
fic purposes ; and that, on the contrary, the powers
which the chief authorities possess of promoting
legislation has given them the fullest possible
scope for the exercise of their own initiative and
energy.
Meanwhile there has been a persistent advance of
central control. In the legislation after 1832, two
conflicting movements were apparent ; the Poor Law
Amendment Act of 1834 subjected the new Poor
Law authorities to rigorous control by a central
department, whilst the Municipal Corporations Act
of the following year gave to the town councils a
very full measure of autonomy, and reduced the
administrative control over them to a very low
point. When between 1848 and 1854 an attempt
was made to set up a General Board of Health,
which should be as powerful as the Poor Law Board
was in its sphere, the result was an absolute failure.
But since 1870 the tendency has been entirely in
one direction, and the policy of central control, more
or less strict, has gained the upper hand. This has
been due chiefly to the recognition of the fact thai
in the interest of the whole community it is neces-
sary to endeavour to secure the maintenance by
local authorities of at least a minimum level of effici-
ency ; and, consciously or unconsciously, we have
been striving to attain this by the extension of tho
12 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
regulative, inspecting, and advisory powers of the
central departments, and by the method of grants-
in-aid from the National Exchequer. In the open-
ing years of the twentieth century, in spite of some
signs of reaction in certain directions, everything
points to the conclusion already stated, that the
growth of decentralised state action (in the form of
the municipalisation of public services, and in other
ways) will continue ; and with that, for the main-
tenance of a national standard, there must come a
still further increase in the control of the central
over the local authorities.
But in spite of this tendency, English local govern-
ment is not in any sense bureaucratic. This is
perhaps the most characteristic feature of our
system as compared with the institutions of our
continental neighbours; the local authorities are
councils of ordinary citizens entirely dependent
upon the electors, and the permanent officials are
only their servants, exercising an influence based,
not as in continental countries (and especially
Prussia) on legal position, but simply on know-
ledge and experience. In fact, local government in
England is lay administration tempered by profes-
sional advice ; whilst to a great extent in continen-
tal Europe it is professional administration tempered
slightly by lay criticism. Our central departments
have no such wide-reaching power of enforcing
obedience on the part of the local authorities by
administrative processes as is possessed by the
bureaucracies of France and Prussia. It is true that
they have it partially in the case of Education and
Police, for which they can withhold the Exchequer
INTRODUCTORY 13
grants if the work is not done to their satisfaction,
and in some Public Health matters where there is
actual default ; but ordinarily all they can do is to
seek the aid of the Courts of Justice if the local
administrators will not carry out the law and will
not listen to ren*onstrances. The courts so invoked
are the ordinary judicial tribunals of the land ; they
are not, as in those countries which have a special
system of administrative law, a set of tribunals con-
stituted in a particular way, and working generally
by procedure and rules of law, which differ from
those of the ordinary courts, and are intended to
safeguard the official against any personal responsi-
bility for acts done by him in his official character.
And so in England the individual citizen, in any
dispute with the authorities, goes for protection or
for remedies to the ordinary tribunals, and before
these the various authorities and officials cannot
invoke any legal privileges.
The predominance of the unprofessional adminis-
trator, the ever-widening range of the sphere of local
government, the subordination of all authorities to
the ordinary law of the land applied by the ordinary
courts, and the limited extent of the merely ad-
ministrative control which the central departments
can exercise over the local councils — these are then
the must characteristic traits of the system of local
o-overnment which we are now to examine in detail.
CHAPTER II
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES
Before we proceed to examine the constitution of
the various areas and authorities established in Eng-
land and Wales for the purposes of local government,
it will be convenient to set out the general scheme
under recent enactments — the Local Government Acts
of 1888 and 1894, the London Government Act of
1899, and the Education Acts, 1902 and 1903. It
is as follows : —
The Administrative County.
The County Borough {i.e. a municipal borough not
subject to, and not represented upon, a county
council).
' The distinction between these
three is not according to
The Municipal Borough
The Urban District
The Rural District
The Parish — Urban and
Rural
population — it is due in
many cases merely to his-
torical accidents.
'The former exists, so far as
administration is concerned,
simply for certain poor law
purposes and has no auto-
nomy ; the latter is a real
local government area,
Within the last four areas the council of the
administrative county of which they form part has
14
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES 15
powers and duties, and it also exercises an amount of
supervision which is far greater in the rural portions
than in the urban districts, and is very slight, and in
fact hardly exists at all, in the municipal boroughs.
The Poor Law Union is an area for the relief of
the poor ; it is commonly a group of parishes not
necessarily coextensive with any other area, and may
be entirely urban, entirely rural, or mixed.
The Metropolis has a special organisation, which
must be considered separately.
In addition to the authorities of these areas, there
are a number of miscellaneous bodies which are not
universal. Such are Port Sanitary Authorities (some-
times identical with town or urban district councils) ;
Harbour and Dock Authorities (also often identical
with town councils) ; Commissioners of Sewers, and
Drainage Boards ; River Conservancy Boards ; Joint
Committees for Asylums and for various other poor
law purposes ; Burial Boards ; and a number of
Joint Boards and Committees of different kinds for
particular purposes. Some of these will be men-
tioned incidentally in the following survey, but in
a general sketch like the present it is unnecessary
to describe them in detail.
i. The Administrative County
The Ancient County is the historical division of
England and Wales, and still remains an area for
parliamentary and judicial purposes, but its im-
portance as an area for local government ceased
when, in 1888, the administrative powers of the
Justices of the Peace were transferred to the new
16 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
elective bodies. It is true that the justices still
issue licences for the sale of intoxicating liquors,
and license private lunatic asylums and inebriate
homes, but these are mere fragments of their former
duties.
For the purposes of local government the county
is divided into the administrative county or counties
and county boroughs. These latter are municipal
boroughs which, either because they have popula-
tions of 50,000, or for other reasons in rare cases,
are withdrawn from the authority of the councils
of the administrative counties ; they have the same
organisation as an ordinary municipal borough, but
their councils exercise the powers of a county
council within their areas. The administrative
counties are in all (including London) 62 in
number, and in most cases they are the same in
extent, except for slight differences of boundaries,
as the ancient counties ; but seven of these — York-
shire, Lincolnshire, Sussex, Hampshire, Northampton-
shire, Cambridgeshire, and Suffolk — are divided into
two or three administrative counties, and London
constitutes a county by itself.
In each the authority is the county council, 1 con-
sisting of members elected triennially by popular
vote (women are not eligible), and aldermen elected
for six years by the councillors. The number of
councillors varies according to local conditions ; the
aldermen are one-third of the number of councillors
and, apart from the longer tenure of their seats,
they have no special position. Each council elects
a chairman and vice-chairman for one year, but
1 The London County Council is described later.
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES 17
they may be, and commonly are, re-elected. The
electorate includes every person (not being an alien
or disqualified under any Act of Parliament) who is
of full age, is "on the 15th July in any year and has
been for the preceding twelve months, in occupa-
tion of premises of the clear yearly value of ten
pounds, has resided during that period within seven
miles of the county boundary, is rated to the relief
of the poor, and is not in arrears of payment.
Contested elections for the councillors' seats have
been comparatively rare; in the first year (1889) for
3240 seats there were 1749 elections, but the number
declined rapidly until, in 1901, only 433 contests took
place in 3349 electoral districts. The controversies
aroused by the Education Act of 1902 increased
the number greatly at the elections of 1904; but
that is probably only a temporary phenomenon, and
in very few places outside London do the county
council elections form the subject of organised party
action. In most cases the councils are filled by
members of much the same social classes as supply
the bench of justices, and only to a slight extent by
representatives of the lower middle and working
classes ; these latter are excluded, in part by the
difficulty of giving up the amount of time needed
when the county centre can be reached only by a
long journey, and still more by the fact that social
position still counts for much with the electors. It
is on the whole true that, " in spite of a democratic
constitution, the classes who had, until 1888, the
privilege of managing county affairs still continue to
do so, a de facto monopoly of wealth and position
being substituted for a constitutional privilege."
B
18 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
But the councils generally command public confi-
dence ; they rarely show political partisanship ; they
have been able to draw into their ranks much ad-
ministrative ability ; and in the conduct of their
work they have shown considerable energy and
enterprise.
That work is extensive and varied. They super-
vise the sanitary administration of the rural district
councils, and themselves have some Public Health
powers ; they maintain county bridges and main
roads, either directly or through the district councils ;
their consent is needed for some of the acts of rural
district and parish councils ; they administer the
Acts relating to allotments, diseases of animals,
weights and measures, and the sale of food and drugs ;
they can establish reformatories and industrial
schools ; with central approval they may make and
work light railways ; they may promote and oppose
Bills in Parliament ; they make bye-laws for a number
of matters for the county ; they can hold and manage
county property, levy rates, and borrow money (with
the consent of the Local Government Board).
Through their representatives on the Standing Joint
Committee they control the county police forces.
Finally, the Education Act of 1902 has greatly in-
creased their work and responsibility by entrusting
to them not only the power of supplying or aiding
" higher education " (where hitherto they had been
limited to the provision of technical instruction), but
also the duty of securing an adequate supply of
elementary education. Further, the Local Govern-
ment Board may transfer to any or all of the councils
any powers, duties, or liabilities of the central depart-
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES 19
ments concerned with local administration — a power
hitherto unemployed but which may be useful in
relieving the pressure upon the central authorities.
In the year -1902-3, for the 61 councils (excluding
London) the total expenditure was £9,566,366 (in-
cluding £1,118,272 defrayed out of loans), the prin-
cipal items being: main roads, £2,393,261; police,
£1,899,222 ; payments to other authorities, chiefly
from the Exchequer Contributions, £1,496,132 ; and
education, £720,559. This last item will naturally
show a very large increase in the next few years,
since the councils have to maintain, not only the
old board schools, but practically all elementary
schools.
The ordinary county council meets only some
four times a year, and its business then is to do little
more than receive the reports of its committees,
to decide any important questions of policy raised
therein, and to pass the resolutions needed to give
effect to the committees' recommendations. All
the real administrative work is done by these com-
mittees, which meet as often as they think desirable ;
every councillor is a member of at least one com-
mittee, and in this way takes part in the actual
conduct of the work, and not merely in the discus-
sions on the council. This activity of the committees
is peculiarly English ; in most continental countries,
and also in the United States, the tendency has
been to give the administrative Avork to a separate
branch of the local authority, and not to the coun-
cillors as such — sometimes these latter have simply
deliberative functions. The result is that thore
are often conflicts between the two branches — and
20 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
these we escape ; whilst our method gives the coun-
cillors a much keener interest in their work.
Of these committees, some are "statutory," i.e.
required by law ; such are the committees for finance,
asylums, diseases of animals, allotments, small hold-
ings, and now education. This last body is to con-
tain, besides the council members, a number of
co-opted persons, including women. The Standing
Joint Committee of a county council and Quarter
Sessions for the control of the police is also statutory,
and occupies a peculiar position, since it is practically
independent of the council, but reports to it and
receives from it the money which it requires. The
other committees of a council are not compulsory,
but are appointed for the purposes and to the number
which each council thinks desirable ; and a committee
may appoint sub-committees. As a county council
usually meets only four times a year, and many ad-
ministrative details cannot wait that length of time
before settlement, it is authorised to delegate to the
committees any of its powers, so as to enable them to
act without waiting for approval; but the power
of levying a rate or raising a loan cannot be so
delegated.
The chief officers of a county council are the clerk,
who is also clerk of the peace, an education secretary
or director, one or more county coroners, one or more
county surveyors, a county treasurer, a public analyst,
inspectors of weights and measures, and generally
(though this is at the option of the council) a medical
officer. They receive their directions from the
committees, and not from the council as a whole;
and it is to the committees that they report.
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES 21
ii. The Urban District
The term ." Urban District " when strictly used
applies to any non-rural area in which there is a
sanitary authority, and it therefore includes municipal
boroughs, which from the point of view of Public
Health administration are urban districts. But the
term is commonly used only for the areas organised
under the Local Government Act of 1894 ; these are
districts which existed prior to 1894 as Improvement
Districts under Commissioners established by local
Acts, or as Local Board of Health Districts under the
Public Health Acts, and other areas since formed by
the county councils and the Local Government
Board.
There were in the year 1902-3 812 such urban
districts, with populations ranging from less than
300 to (in extreme cases) over 75,000. Their organis-
ation is quite simple ; in each the authority is the
council, consisting solely of members elected either
one-third each year, or all every third year ; women
are eligible, and there are no aldermen. The chair-
man (who holds office for one year but may be re-
appointed) can be elected by the council from outside,
and during his tenure of office he is a justice of the
peace for the county. The electors are all persons
(including women), not being aliens or disqualified
by parliamentary enactment, who are on the local
government register of electors or the parliamentary
register; they include therefore married women and
lodgers. The same qualification holds in rural
districts and parishes. The council must meet once
a month at least, and it works by means of
22 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
committees, all or any of which can include persons
who are not members of the council. To those
committees which deal with sanitary and highway
business all the powers of the council in those
matters may be delegated, except as regards the
levying of a rate or the raising of loans.
The councils are the sanitary and highway autho-
rities for their areas ; they may take over the main-
tenance of the main roads within their districts
from the county council, in return for the payment
of an annual sum; they may make use of the
" Adoptive Acts " for the provision of burial-grounds,
allotments, baths and washhouses, libraries, open
spaces, museums, and gymnasiums ; they may make
bye-laws of various kinds ; they can establish isola-
tion hospitals ; and may exercise any powers which
they can get under Provisional Orders or Private
Acts for gasworks, tramways, electric light and
power works, &c. Under the Education Act, 1902,
the council of any urban district with 20,000
inhabitants > may be an authority for elementary
education, and the council of any district, whatever
its size, may supply, or aid the supply of education
other than elementary; but in both these matters
the powers can be surrendered to the local county
council, and this is being done fairly generally by
the smaller areas. For a number of purposes a
combination of districts with a joint committee is
allowed.
It is 1 evident from this list that the work of the
urban district councils may be very extensive and
important, and there are some whose activities are
greater than those of many town councils. The
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES 23
principal officials in the service of an urban district
council are the clerk, treasurer, surveyor, medical
officer of health, and sanitary inspectors, and the
heads of any " trading " departments which may
be established. In 1902-3 the expenditure of the
urban districts was £12,267,412, of which £3,916,421
was defrayed out of loans. The chief items were :
maintenance and cleaning of highways, streets, and
bridges, £2,396,608 ; sewerage and 'sewage disposal,
£1,947,922 ; gasworks, waterworks, tramways, elec-
tric light undertakings, and markets, £3,187,334. As
regards this last item it should be pointed out
that almost exactly half of it was defrayed out of
loans, and that the receipts from the undertakings
(not including any allowance for the value of light-
ing and water supplied to local authorities for their
own purposes) were £1,600,260. The only sub-
stantial differences between the position of a large
urban district with an active council and a
municipal borough of the same size are that the
former has not the formal dignity and some of
the privileges connected with the administration
of justice and police which the municipalities enjoy,
and that it is much more strictly controlled by
the Local Government Board, which audits its
accounts.
iii. Tfie Rural District
From 1875 the rural portion of each Poor Law
Union (a group of parishes combined together for
the administration of poor relief)— that is, the part
of each union which was not in an urban area —
24 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
formed the rural sanitary district, with the board
of guardians as the authority. But some of these
lay in two counties, and the Act of 1894 directed
that in such a case each part should become a
rural district. Each of these areas (there are 672
of them) has a council, elected for three years, and
women are eligible: each rural district councillor
is the representative of his electoral division (parish)
on the board of guardians for the Poor Law Union
of which it forms part. One-third of the members
retire every year, unless the county council allows
the whole body to retire every third year. The
chairman is ex-officio a justice for the county.
The rural district councils have charge of the
sanitary administration of the whole country out-
side the urban districts, and for this purpose, in
addition to the ordinary powers which they possess,
the Local Government Board may confer on any
council, for the whole or part of its area, any or
all of the powers of an urban sanitary authority.
This is constantly done, and in the year 1903-4
alone the Board granted powers of this kind to
128 rural districts. As sanitary authorities the
councils may carry out drainage schemes, provide
hospitals for infectious diseases, and do many other
things under the Public Health Acts ; they may
provide allotments ; they may carry out schemes
under the Housing Acts ; and they can make
arrangements for an adequate water supply. Some
of the sanitary duties may be delegated to the
parish councils, or to parochial committees. Next
to sanitation the most important part of their work
is highway administration ; they are responsible for
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES 25
all the roads (some 95,000 miles in length) which
are not main roads, and they may see to the upkeep
of main roads as the agents of the county councils.
Out of a total ordinary expenditure in 1902-3 of
£3,917,629 by the rural districts, more than five-
eighths (£2,624,000) was upon highways and
bridges, and of the total debt of £4,180,105 more
than £3,610,000 had been incurred for sewerage and
waterworks. These figures illustrate better than
anything else the nature of the work of these
authorities ; they act (as do all English councils)
mainly by committees, which as regards formation
and working are similar to those of urban districts ;
and on the whole, considering the difficulties which
have to be encountered in the more sparsely popu-
lated areas, the work is well done. The principal
officers are the clerk (who is generally also clerk
to the guardians), treasurer, medical officer, a
sanitary inspector and surveyor (though these last
two offices are often held together).
iv. The Parish
The unit of local government is the Parish, which
for this purpose is defined as " a place for which a
separate poor-rate is or can be made, or a separate
overseer is or can be appointed." The number
of such parishes was 14,797 in 1902-3 ; but only
" rural " parishes (i.e. those which lie within a rural
district) have a special organisation for local govern-
ment purposes.
In every parish, urban and rural, there exists for
ecclesiastical purposes a vestry, which may be
20 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
" open " or " common " — in which case all ratepay-
ing inhabitants may attend ; or it may be " select,"
generally in those parishes which have adopted
Hobhouse's Act of 1831, and then it is composed
of elected vestrymen. In either case it is concerned
solely with ecclesiastical matters, such as the elec-
tion of churchwardens and the maintenance of the
church. In an urban district, unless the power
has been transferred by an order of the Local
Government Board to the urban district council, the
vestry still nominates the overseers of the poor —
but in most cases the power has been so transferred.
The ecclesiastical parish is, however, not always now
identical with the civil parish in urban areas.
For general administration the rural parishes
alone are important. In each there is a parish
meeting, of all persons who are on the local govern-
ment and parliamentary registers ; it elects its own
chairman. When the parish has a population of
300 or more, it elects a parish council, either at
the parish meeting or by poll ; and for this body
women and persons living within three miles of
the parish boundaries are eligible. Parishes with
populations of between 300 and 100 can require the
county council to authorise them to elect councils,
and even parishes with less than 100 inhabitants
can do so if they can obtain permission. On the
other hand, parishes may be combined by order of
their county council ; in fact county councils and
the Local Government Board have power to unite,
divide, or alter parishes. In the year 1902-3 there
were 12,985 rural parishes; and of these 7250 were
entitled to parish councils, and the remainder to
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES 27
parish meetings only, There are some 2000 parishes
with less than " 100 inhabitants, and about nine-
tenths of the total number have populations of
less than 1000.
The parish meeting is held at least twice a year in
those parishes which have no council ; its officers
are the chairman, and the overseers who are ap-
pointed by it for the discharge of certain duties
connected with the poor law, and for the making of
electoral and jury lists. The chairman and overseers
form a body corporate for the holding of parish
property, and the chairman conducts whatever ad-
ministrative business there may be. In the other
parishes a meeting must be held at least once a
year, but it can be more frequent. The number of
members of the council ranges from five to fifteen,
and is fixed by the county council. A parish
council elects whatever committees it thinks de-
sirable ; and it has the same power as a district
council in the matter of co-opting on the committees
persons not members of its own body.
A parish council or meeting may acquire rights
of way, and control or maintain footpaths, manage
civil parish property, and apply (with consent of
the parish meeting) the Allotments Acts and the
various other Adoptive Acts as to recreation grounds,
libraries, baths and washhouses, burial-grounds, light-
ing; it may provide protection against fire, and
watch local sanitary conditions in order to keep the
rural district council informed — by consent of that
body it may take over some of its sanitary powers ;
if the district council neglects its work the parish
may appeal to the county authorities. The parish
28 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
council or meeting is now also represented upon
the committees of managers of all public elementary
schools.
There is then plenty of work which might be done
by a parish council ; but the fact that very little is
done is scarcely the fault of the parishes. The
expenditure of these small authorities furnishes a
fair though not exact index of their activity: in
1902-3, out of 7250 parishes entitled to parish
councils, 6531 had financial transactions of some
kind ; but of the remaining 5735 parishes only 390
had any receipts and expenditure. They spent in
all £228,917 (and £25,332 out of loans). The
largest item was nearly £60,000 for lighting, and
the next two items of importance were £39,500 for
the purposes of the Burial Acts, and £31,000 for
allotments. They spent £9996 on footpaths and
rights of way, £9271 on protection against fire,
£7232 on commons and open spaces, £759 on
libraries, and £175 on baths and washhouses. Nine-
tenths of the outstanding debt had been incurred
under the Burial Acts. There were 84 joint boards
appointed by parish councils, but their total expen-
diture was only £3388.
Rural conditions vary greatly: in some parishes
there is no one to take the initiative, and little is
done, whilst in others the presence of a single
enlightened and active councillor has resulted in
much successful work. But there is always the
financial difficulty; the general rates which may
be levied for parish purposes, and the special rates
under the Adoptive Acts, are nearly all limited ;
most of the parishes have no large rateable value,
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES
29
and very little money could be procured, even if
the general dislike to anything involving an in-
crease of the rates could be overcome. In spite of
these difficulties some of the parish councils have
succeeded in doing a fair amount of useful work ;
but for the parishes with only a parish meeting,
and even for the majority of the others, there
seems no clear reason for the continuance of the
effort to retain them as administrative areas.
Practically all the work of local government is
done in them by the rural district councils, and it
would simplify matters to recognise this in form
as well as in fact.
CHAPTER III
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES— (continued)
iv. The Municipal Borough
A Municipal Borough is an urban area which has
received a charter of incorporation from the Crown,
and is governed under the Municipal Corporations
Act of 1882. It enjoys a certain privileged status,
and to-day new charters are granted only after an
enquiry, and applications for them to the Privy
Council are often refused; but at the reform of
1835 many very small and unimportant corporators
were left in the possession of municipal rank, and
consequently there are now extraordinary differences
between the municipal boroughs. At the head of
the list comes Liverpool, with some 725,000 in-
habitants, and there are 30 other boroughs with
populations exceeding 100,000 ; whilst at the other
end there are no less than 67 with populations of
under 5000, with Montgomery (1034) and Hedon
(1020) last of all. Certain boroughs (69 in number)
— mainly those which have more than 50,000 in-
habitants — are " county boroughs," exempted from
the authority of the county councils in whose areas
they are geographically situated, and their councils
have, in addition to their ordinary powers, most of
those exercised by a countv council.
80
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES 31
There are other differences between the boroughs.
Some of these are matters of status : there are
boroughs which rank as " cities," either because they
are the seats of bishops or because they have been
granted that title by the Crown (as Sheffield) ; in a
small number the chief magistrate is styled "Lord
Mayor." More important by far are the differences
connected with the administration of justice : some
boroughs have a stipendiary magistrate appointed
by the Crown; many have a separate Commission
of the Peace ; and some of these latter have also
Quarter Sessions in which justice is administered,
not by a bench of magistrates, but by a legal officer,
the Recorder, whose appointment is in the gift of
the Crown. It should be added that there are a
few " counties of cities or towns," and these have
sheriffs of their own.
From the point of view of local government the
sole important distinction is between county and
non-county boroughs, and this does not affect the
municipal constitution. In each borough the
authority is the town council, which discharges
two functions distinct in law and to some extent
also in fact so far as finance is concerned ; it is the
representative body charged with the conduct of
" municipal affairs," and it is also the urban sanitary
authority. It consists of from nine to seventy-two
(or in a few cases even more) councillors (women
are ineligible) elected for three years, one-third
retiring annually; and aldermen (one-third of the
ii umber of councillors) elected for six years by the
councillors. The electors are all persons who arc of
full age ; are, on the 15th July in any year, and have
32 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
been for the preceding twelve months, in occupation of
premises of the annual value of ten pounds, and reside
in the borough or within seven miles thereof; are
rated to the relief of the poor, and are not in arrears
as to payment of rates. Unmarried women, if they
fulfil the other conditions, are qualified to be
electors. The receipt of poor relief (except medical
attendance), during the twelve months, is a dis-
qualification. In municipal elections contests are
frequent, and are commonly more or less on the
lines of party politics. The Mayor is elected by
the whole council, of which he need not be a
member ; he holds office for one year, but is fre-
quently re-elected, especially in the smaller boroughs.
The Mayor is charged with no special functions;
he is ex officio a member of all committees, he is
a justice of the peace and chairman of the borough
bench during his year of office, and remains a
magistrate for the ensuing year, and he represents
the borough at all official ceremonies. His influence
upon the municipal administration and policy may
be very considerable, but it is based only upon his
personal ability, experience, and force ; he has no
special powers like to those exercised by the
American or French mayors or the German burgo-
masters, who all have supreme control of the
administrative work of their cities — the councils
there existing only for the purposes of deliberation
and criticism. The aldermen are usually chosen
from those councillors who have served longest,
though this rule is sometimes overthrown for party
purposes ; like the county aldermen they do not
form a separate chamber, except in the unreformed
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES 33
city of London, whose constitution will be described
later.
The powers of a town council in its twofold
character are almost too numerous to be specified.
It has the right to acquire and manage municipal
property ; it is the public health authority, and
deals with drainage and sewerage, water-supply,
lighting, markets, and street improvements, and
may provide cemeteries and hospitals for infectious
diseases ; it can carry out housing schemes ; it may
apply the Adoptive Acts in regard to libraries, baths
and washhouses, parks and open spaces, museums,
art galleries, and gymnasiums ; it may establish tram-
ways of any kind ; and it may make bye-laws " for
the good rule and government of the borough."
Boroughs with more than 10,000 inhabitants may
have separate police forces, but they do not all
make use of this right. All county boroughs, and
a number of others having Quarter Sessions, are
required to provide accommodation for pauper
lunatics, and they may add to this for lunatics
who are not paupers. In all county boroughs the
municipal councils are the authorities for elemen-
tary and higher education ; all other boroughs,
whatever their size, may contribute to, or provide,
higher education, but only those with populations
of 10,000 or more are to be distinct areas for ele-
mentary education, unless they choose to surrender
their powers to the local county council. This
difference between boroughs with 10,000 inhabitants
and boroughs with less applies in a number of
other matters, as police, the administration of the
Acts relating to discuses of animals, weights and
c
34 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
measures, and the sale of food and drugs ; boroughs
with 10,000 inhabitants usually administer these
matters themselves, whilst the smaller ones are
merged in the county. Finally, a municipal borough
may exercise any other powers which it can induce
Parliament to grant to it by a Private Act, and of
recent years there has been a great extension of
municipal activity by this means. The munici-
palities are almost entirely independent, in the
exercise of their legal powers, of any outside control
whatsoever. General expenses are defrayed out of
the borough fund, which is supplied by the revenue
from municipal property supplemented by the pro-
ceeds of a uniform rate ; whilst sanitary expenses
are usually met out of the district rate, levied on a
slightly different valuation.
All town councils work through committees.
Some of these are "statutory," as the watch com-
mittee (where there is a separate police force), the
education committee (on which there must be co-
opted members), and the committees for lunacy
and diseases of animals in boroughs which are
separate areas for those purposes. Others are
appointed by a council at its pleasure ; no co-opted
members are permitted except on the education
committee, and indeed they are usually not desired.
It has been pointed out that a county council can
delegate to its committees any or all of its powers
except those connected with finance ; but a town
council cannot do this except for the education
committee — for all others the Act of 1882 requires
that the proceedings " shall be submitted to the
council for its approval," the detailed application
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES 35
of this rule being left to be settled by the standing
orders of each council. In practice a report from
the committee is usually presented at each meeting ;
some recommendations are passed en bloc, whilst
for others, usually those involving expenditure
above a certain amount, separate resolutions are
required. The principal officer of a town council
is the town clerk, who is its secretary and legal
adviser, and is in many cases the ruling spirit of
the administration, becoming such by reason of
his permanent position, knowledge, and experience,
but not because of any legal status. Other officials
are the borough treasurer, and the heads of the
various administrative departments, which may be
few or many, according to the extent of the
municipal activities.
It will be evident from what has already been
said as to the diversities between the boroughs in
size, that the extent and quality of their work
differs enormously ; and that in many cases urban
districts are much more important than many
of the municipalities. But in the great boroughs
the amount of work is very large and varied, and
the sphere of municipal activity is ever widening.
It is not necessary here to describe it in detail —
its general character is sufficiently well known, and
some special problems connected with it will be
discussed later. But it is perhaps worth while to
remark here that the ability and energy displayed
is not confined to the large towns, but is becoming
more and more general, alike in boroughs and urban
districts. The total ordinary expenditure of tin:
municipalities was for l ( Ji)'2-','> Xilu^OJ/jOB, and the
36
ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
expenditure out of loans £17,119,534. The follow-
ing table shows the principal items, and the amounts
in the loan column may serve to indicate the lines
of development. (The expenditure by the school
boards in that year is not included in the above
totals.)
Ordinary
Expenditure
]
Expenditure.
out of Loans.
Debt Charges
£9,985,268
Gasworks
4,743,392
£762,666
Electric Lighting
725,223
3,053,845
Public Lighting .
1,057,026
Streets and Roads
2,624,496
2,690,160
Private Street Im-
}
provements
933,156
100,740
Tramways .
1,961,318
3,783,739
Police
1,641,078
132,031
Establishment Charges
}
Salaries, &c.
1,418,161
...
Waterworks
1,250,584
2,559,996
Scavenging (other than
streets)
}
1,160,249
218,199
Sewerage, &c.
847,112
970,331
Education .
544,379
...
Hospitals
514,763
373,589
Parks, &c. .
398,969
511,918
Museums and Libx-arie
s
339,710
Asylums
122,952
241,761
Housing
49,502
483,221
v. The Poor Law Union
The Poor Law Union is the area formed for the
purposes of the relief of the poor under the Poor
Law Amendment Act, 1834. It may be a single
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES 37
parish, but it is commonly, as its name implies, a
group of parishes ; " the general idea on which the
union was formed was that of taking a market
town as a centre, and uniting the surrounding
parishes, the inhabitants of which resorted to its
market, such a centre being supposed to be con-
venient for the attendance of guardians and of
parish officers. A limiting principle was that in
the first instance the union should be small enough
for the guardians to have a personal knowledge of
all the details of its management" (Wright and
Hobhouse, p. 9). The unions are 657 in number
(including 10 " contributory out-relief unions "), and
they may be entirely rural, or entirely urban, or
partly urban and partly rural. The authority in
each is the Board of Guardians ; the members are
specially elected only in unions which are entirely
urban, or in the urban portions of mixed unions ;
elsewhere the persons elected as rural district coun-
cillors are the representatives of their electoral areas
on the Boards of Guardians. Women are eligible.
Each Board chooses its own chairman and vice-chair-
man, who need not be members; it may co-opt not
more than two persons, and it can appoint whatever
committees of its own members it thinks necessary.
The main task of the guardians is the relief of the
poor, and their work in that matter will be described
fully in a later chapter. But they have a number
of other duties. It is natural that they should be
entrusted with the levying of most of the local rates
for local purposes, making the assessments and en-
forcing the collection through the overseers of the
several parishes; for the poor rate is the oldest rate
412741
38 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
in force, and the machinery established to collect
it, and the valuation of property made for it, could
be conveniently used for rates imposed later. They
are still responsible for the enforcement of the
Vaccination Acts — this is a survival of the time
prior to 1894 when they were sanitary authorities;
and they appoint the registrars of births, deaths,
and marriages. Their principal officers are the
clerk, treasurer, relieving officers, vaccination officers,
poor law medical officers, and the workhouse staff;
and they may appoint paid collectors of rates. For
some special purposes {e.g. provision of poor law
schools) combinations of unions are permitted.
vi. The Metropolis
The Metropolis was originally formed by the
Metropolis Management Act of 1855, which denned
it to include the area of the city of London and
certain parishes specified in the schedule, and set
up a central authority (the Metropolitan Board of
Works) for a number of purposes. But the govern-
ment of London in its present form dates from
the Local Government Act, 1888, which created
the County Council, and the London Government
Act, 1899, which swept away a great number of
small authorities and replaced them by a much
simpler arrangement of more important bodies —
the Metropolitan Borough Councils.
The main " central " authority is the London
County Council, which governs an administrative
county of 121 square miles, with a population in
1901 of 4,536,541. It consists of 118 councillors,
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES 39
elected (two for each parliamentary division) for
three years, and 19 aldermen elected by the council
for six years. It elects a chairman, vice-chairman,
and deputy-chairman from its own ranks.
The work of administering an area with a popula-
tion as large as that of some continental states is
necessarily very great, and fortunately London has
so far not experienced any lack of men both willing
and able to do the work ; it has drawn into the
council a great amount of varied experience and
ability. It is a noteworthy fact that although the
elections are practically always fought on party
lines, and constant attempts have been made to
identify the municipal parties with national political
parties, the representation of London on the County
Council has never, since the foundation of that body,
corresponded to, but has been entirely different from,
its representation in Parliament. A real municipal
spirit has at last been aroused in the capital, and it
has been evoked by, and centres round, the county
authority established in 1889. The council deals
with main drainage, protection against fire, bridges
and ferries (except those in the area of the city),
means of transit, street improvements, asylums,
housing, parks and open spaces ; it has itself con-
siderable powers in public health matters, and
exercises a supervisory authority over the sanitary
administration of the borough councils; and it has
duties and powers in regard to a multitude of other
public services. The council has already built up a
most elaborate and far-reaching system of " technical
education " ; and in 1904 its powers in respect of
education were vastly increased by the transference
40 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
to it of all the work of the School Board, and by the
grant of additional powers for the supply of higher
education. The estimated expenditure (including
that on education) not out of loans for the year
1904-5 was £8,996,870.
There are several other "central" authorities of
one kind and another in the Metropolis. The
Corporation of the City of London (about one square
mile in extent) consists of a Lord Mayor, Aldermen,
and Common Councillors, who are elected by the
"liverymen" i.e. the members of the City Com-
panies, which are the descendants of the mediaeval
gilds. The aldermen form a second chamber, are
ex-ojjicio justices of the peace, and serve the office
of Lord Mayor for one year in order of seniority.
The corporation must be regarded as a "central"
authority, since it occupies a special position, due
in part to its historic dignity, and in part to its
enjoyment of a number of privileges. Thus it is
the port sanitary authority, it maintains its own
police force, and it has many powers connected
with the administration of justice ; it possesses also
a great amount of civic property, controls certain
markets, and maintains several bridges.
The Metropolitan Asylums Board is composed of
representatives of the London Boards of Guardians,
and of persons nominated by the Local Government
Board, and provides asylums for imbeciles, hospitals
for infectious diseases, and some children's hospitals.
The Metropolitan Water Board has recently been
formed to take over from private water companies
the supply of an area some 620 square miles in
extent, and contains representatives of the various
THE AREAS AND AUTHORITIES 41
authorities within that area ; the Thames and Lea
Rivers are managed by Conservancy Boards which
include members nominated by local bodies.
Finally, the metropolitan police, who safeguard an
area extending to 15 miles from Charing Cross,
and including 693 square miles, are under com-
missioners appointed by the Home Office. Although
the metropolitan police perform many of the
duties of what elsewhere is known as " state police "
(extradition, &c), the administrative county of
London bears practically the whole cost, apart from
the contribution which the central government
makes to all police forces ; but its council has no
voice in the management of the force.
The " local " areas of London government are the
metropolitan boroughs, twenty-eight in number,
with populations ranging from 341,000 in Islington
to 53,000 in Stoke Newington. In each there is the
usual council of ordinary members, elected for three
years, and all retiring every third year, and alder-
men elected by the councillors for six years. The
whole council elects the Mayor, who is in the same
position as the mayor of a municipal borough. The
metropolitan boroughs do not enjoy the same status
as the municipalities outside London; they lack
some of the privileges and powers of the latter, and
are subject to considerable control both by the
County Council and the Local Government Board.
The councils administer the Public Health Acts ;
thoy are the highway authorities ; they are respon-
sible for the assessment and collection of local rates;
and they may make use of the various Adoptive
Acts, including those relating to housing. The
42 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
thirty Poor Law Unions of London are not neces-
sarily conterminous in area with the metropolitan
boroughs. The total cost of London government by
all the authorities of all kinds in the year 1902-3
was £22,818,000 out of ordinary revenue, and
£7,763,000 out of loans, whilst the total outstand-
ing debt at the end of that financial year was
£67,515,000.
CHAPTER IV
THE CENTRAL AUTHORITIES
There are five departments of the central adminis-
tration which in one way and another are concerned
with local government in England ; and it will be
convenient to notice at this point their constitution,
and the general character of those powers and duties
whose detailed application will come before us in
subsequent chapters.
I — The Departments
i. The Home Office
The office of Secretary of State for the Home De-
partment was established in 1782, but did not take
its present form until the year 1801, by which date
it had been relieved of military and colonial matters.
The Home Secretary is the first and principal
Secretary of State, and as such is in a special re-
lation to the Sovereign, and is the official channel
of communication between the Sovereign and the
subject in such matters as petitions and addresses;
he exercises the functions which in other countries
are entrusted to a Minister of Justice ; he is the
authority for the administration of the Factory Acts
and other industrial legislation ; and he has a large
43
44 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
number of miscellaneous powers and duties. His
chief assistants are a Parliamentary Under-Secretary
and a Permanent Secretary.
The most important duty of the Home Secretary
which brings him into close relations with the local
authorities is the control of the police forces of the
country. The metropolitan police (but not those of
the city of London) are dependent entirely and solely
upon him, and are directed by commissioners whom
he appoints ; all other forces he inspects, and a cer-
tificate of efficiency granted by him on the report of
his inspectors is necessary before a local authority can
receive its share of the police grant from the central
exchequer. Moreover, all " police " bye-laws made by
local authorities require his approval. The Factory
Acts are administered to a large extent by inspectors
appointed by the Home Secretary and subject only
to him ; but recent legislation has laid many duties
upon the local sanitary authorities in regard to the
inspection of workshops, and in that matter they are
bound to carry out the directions of the Home
Secretary, and to report to him. He is also charged
with the supervision of the administration of the
Burial Acts; he has powers in regard to lunatics;
his approval is required for bye-laws under the Em-
ployment of Children Act (1903), and- for housing
schemes in the metropolis; and he inspects refor-
matory and industrial schools.
ii. The Local Government Board
By far the greater part of the central control of
English local authorities is exercised by the Local
THE CENTRAL AUTHORITIES 45
Government Board, which was created in 1 871 to
concentrate in one department most of those powers
and duties relating to poor relief, public health, and
local government generally, which hitherto had
been entrusted to various offices, such as the Poor
Law Board, the Home Office, and the Privy Council ;
it amounts almost to what is elsewhere known as the
"ministry of the interior." Since 1871 the incessant
increase, with legislative approval, of the activities
of local authorities has brought additional work to
the department, until there are not lacking signs
that it is overburdened. The " Board " consists
nominally of a number of Privy Councillors holding
high political office, but it never meets ; and the
work is done by the President, assisted by a Parlia-
mentary Secretary and a Permanent Secretary, with
a very large staff.
The Board inherited the powers of the Poor Law
Board, which had built up a most elaborate system
of minute control over all the actions of the local
poor law authorities; that has been maintained
practically unchanged, and the authority of the
Board is supreme in all matters relating to the relief
of the poor. It is also the supervising authority for
the administration of the enactments relating to
public health, but though its powers in this respect
are considerable, they are not nearly so extensive as
in poor relief; it has, however, special authority to
deal with plagues and epidemics. In matters of
general local government it can divide and unite
areas, alter boundaries, and make regulations as to
the constitution of authorities and the conduct of
elections. In some cases, for all these three groups
46 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
of powers, the formal approval of Parliament is
required for the decisions of the department, but in
many cases it is not necessary. The Board has the
very important task of watching over the financial
operations of the various local bodies ; its approval
is usually required for the raising of loans, and it
audits the accounts of all local authorities (but not
of the councils of municipal boroughs, except for
education) and has various powers in connection
therewith. Finally, it collects and publishes an-
nually all manner of statistical and other information
relating to the condition and development of English
local government generally.
iii. The Board of Education
In 1839 a committee of the Privy Council was ap-
pointed to administer the annual parliamentary
grants for elementary education, and in 1856 this
" Educational Establishment of the Privy Council "
was combined with the "Establishment for the
Encouragement of Science and Art," which had been
formed gradually between 1836 and 1853 under the
Board of Trade. The Education Department thus
created remained in form, and to some extent in
reality, under the Privy Council until the year 1899,
when its constitution was changed and it became an
independent Board. Like the Local Government
Board, its membership is merely nominal ; the sole
active and responsible member is the President,
aided by a Parliamentary Secretary and a Per-
manent Secretary.
The work of the Board is sufficiently indicated
THE CENTRAL AUTHORITIES 47
by its name. It has the general administration
of the Education Acts, and for that purpose it con-
trols, supervises, and inspects all education in elemen-
tary schools, science and art schools, and evening
schools, which are supported by public money ; it
inspects training colleges aided from public funds ;
it may inspect secondary schools which desire it
to do so, or it may authorise their inspection by
universities or other educational bodies. Its ap-
proval is required for all schemes constituting
local education authorities ; and it must be con-
sulted by those authorities in regard to their plans
to supply or aid the supply of higher education,
though for this it has no powers like to those which
it exercises over elementary education. The Board
has three departments — general matters and elemen-
tary education, secondary schools, technology and
higher education in science and art, and for each
there is a staff of inspectors : the secondary schools
division is quite small, since the powers of the
Board in that direction are new and undeveloped.
The Board is assisted by a consultative committee
of experts in education, and keeps a register of
teachers (compulsory only in the case of elementary
teachers) under the supervision of a small special
committee of the same kind.
iv. The Board of Trade
The Board of Trade is the oldest of the Boards
which have developed out of committees of the
Privy Council, since under various forms it can
be traced back to the year 1G22. But it becamo
48 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
a permanent establishment only in 1786, and since
then its constitution has undergone various changes.
It is now an independent Board of nominal members,
with the usual President, Parliamentary Secretary,
and Permanent Secretary. Its powers and duties
are very extensive and varied, but here we are
concerned only with its relations to local govern-
ment, and these are not considerable. It is in-
terested mainly in the " trading " undertakings of
the various authorities : it grants Provisional
Orders (requiring confirmation by Parliament) for
the supply of tramways, and to some extent of
gas, by local authorities; it issues electric lighting
licences; in conjunction with the Local Govern-
ment Board it considers proposals for water supplies.
It also constitutes (by Provisional Order) and
supervises harbour, dock, and pier authorities ;
and its approval is required for bye-laws made by
local bodies under the Weights and Measures
Acts.
v. The Board of Agriculture
This department was created in 1889, and in
form resembles the other Boards which have been
described, with the exception that it has no Parlia-
mentary Secretary. The councils of counties and
of boroughs with more than 10,000 inhabitants
are bound to carry out the orders of the Board
under the Diseases of Animals and Destructive
Insects Acts, and for that purpose appoint special
committees. The Board of Agriculture also has
powers in regard to public markets.
THE CENTRAL AUTHORITIES 49
II. — Methods of Departmental Action
The power of general supervision possessed by
the various departments, which have been enume-
rated above, is exercised in a variety of ways,
ranging from simple guidance of local action to
the coercion of recalcitrant authorities. The follow-
ing list is an attempt to summarise the various
methods by which the duties laid by Parliament
on the departments are discharged.
(a.) The issue of orders and regulations for the
application and enforcement of legislative enact-
ments. It is often impossible for Parliament to
do more than lay down general principles ; in
any case it cannot provide for all possible emer-
gencies or arrange all the administrative details,
and so it leaves these matters (within clearly de-
fined statutory limits) to the departments con-
cerned. This " sub-legislative " power of the
departments is very great ; thus the actual working
of the poor law system of England is the outcome
of a multitude of orders issued since 1834 by the
Poor Law Board and its successor, the Local
Government Board, which in 1903-4 issued no
less than 852 orders (some general and others
applicable only to special districts) on this subject
alone. The Board of Education has very wide
powers for the detailed application of the Educa-
tion Acts. Similarly the Home Secretary may
by order declare any trade to be dangerous or
injurious to health, and lay down special regulations
as to its conduct; and the whole tendency of
50 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
recent factory legislation has been to substitute
this system of orders for the settlement of details
by enactment. The Board of Agriculture, again,
may make whatever orders it deems expedient for
the application of the Diseases of Animals Acts.
(6.) The discretional grant of powers to local
authorities. Parliament has in a number of cases
laid down the principle that local authorities may
do certain things if they can obtain the approval
of a government department. So, for instance,
there is a difference betAveen urban and rural sani-
tary authorities as to powers, but the Local Govern-
ment Board may confer on a rural authority, for
the whole or part of its area, any or all of the
powers of an urban authority. Practically Pro-
visional Orders granted by government departments
(as by the Board of Trade under the Tramways
Acts, and by the Local Government Board under
a number of enactments) may be included under
this head ; since, although legislative approval is
required for an order to become valid, it is never
refused. Thus in 1903-4 the Local Government
Board granted 72 orders ; only 7 were opposed in
Parliament, and all were approved.
(c.) Closely related to this is the approval of
action proposed to be taken by local authorities.
So "police bye-laws" must be approved by the
Home Office, and other bye-laws by the Local Govern-
ment Board or Board of Trade ; proposals as to
loans, housing schemes, and many other matters
require departmental approval in the same way.
With this we may connect the duty of departments
to report to the Select Committees of Parliament
THE CENTRAL AUTHORITIES 51
on all private Bills (whether promoted by local
authorities or private persons) dealing with matters
in which they are interested ; the Local Govern-
ment Board so reported in 1903-4 on 118 private
Bills, of which 53 were promoted by local authorities.
(d.) Control of officers. This power is greatest
in the case of the poor law administration, for
there the approval of the Local Government Board
is required for all except subordinate appointments
by the guardians; whilst, on the other hand, the
Board can dismiss the local officials without the
consent, and even against the will, of the guardians.
The Board's approval is also required for the ap-
pointment of all those officials of sanitary authori-
ties whose salaries are met partially out of state
grants. But except in the case of the poor law
the bureaucratic control of all local officials, which
is widespread upon the continent, does not exist
in England ; the permanent local officials are the
servants of the local elected authority, with which
alone the central departments can deal.
(e.) Inspection. All the government departments
which are concerned with local administration have
stall's of inspectors. The Homo Office has its in-
spectors of constabulary forces; the Local Govern-
ment Board has poor law, medical, and engineering
inspectors, and auditors (who are really inspectors
of local finances); the Board of Education neces-
sarily has a very large staff, and the Boards of
Trade and Agriculture have inspectors for the
various matters with which they deal.
The inspector of any department has no power
to order or authorise action — all he can do is to
52 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
report ; in some instances his report may be followed
by directions from the central department to the
local authorities, and in others recommendations
alone are possible. In the case of police and educa-
tion, the report of the inspectors determines whether
or not a local authority shall receive the govern-
ment grant. The system of inspection, as will be
seen in subsequent chapters, enables the central
departments to keep watch over local action, and
at the same time puts a considerable amount of
expert advice at the service of the various local
Boards. The poor law inspectors have the right
to attend any meetings of Boards of Guardians, and
constantly do so ; the medical inspectors may be
present at a meeting of a local sanitary authority
(not being a town council) if so directed by the
Local Government Board.
■ (/.) Guidance of local administration and issue
of information. The Board of Education must be
consulted by all local education authorities in regard
to their schemes for the promotion of higher educa-
tion ; and it publishes a series of special reports on
education at home and abroad, which are of great
value. The Local Government Board should be,
and is to a considerable extent, a guide to the local
sanitary authorities in problems of public health,
which often require much scientific knowledge and
highly skilled investigation for their solution. The
" model bye-laws " issued by various departments
are much used by the local Boards, and are some-
times followed even too readily. All the depart-
ments issue annual reports which contain much
information as to the work of local authorities, and
THE CENTRAL AUTHORITIES 53
the conduct of the various public services which
they have been called upon, or have volunteered,
to undertake.
(g.) Direction of action. Not only is it the duty
of the departments to see that local authorities
discharge the imperative obligations laid upon them
by Parliament, but in some cases they may turn
an optional into an imperative duty. So, for
example, in the Public Health Acts, there recurs
frequently the phrase : " every local authority may,
and when required by order of the Local Govern-
ment Board shall " do certain things. It should
be noted that these powers of direction may in
some cases involve an interpretation of the law ;
and the departments are often called upon by local
authorities to determine the often obscurely ex-
pressed intentions of the legislature. But such
interpretations, though commonly accepted, are not
necessarily binding ; the question can always be
raised in a court of law.
(h.) But a local authority may either discharge
inadequately the duties laid upon it by Parliament
(or by the departments acting within their statutory
powers), or it may neglect them entirely, and refuse
to listen to remonstrance. In the former case, if
there is no grant-in-aid determined in amount by
the efficiency of the service, the action of the depart-
ments is confined to exhortation to improvement.
In the case of actual neglect of duty, however, we
are brought back to a characteristic feature of
English public administration which was noticed
in the introductory chapter. The central offices
can do little in the way of administrative action.
54 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
It is true that the Local Government Board, if a
Board of Guardians resist it in poor law matters,
can practically force the permanent local officials
to do its will by the threat of dismissal ; but that
is clearly not a satisfactory solution, and would not
carry the department very far. It is true also
that under the Public Health Acts, if a local
authority neglects its duty, the Local Government
Board may authorise any person or persons to do
the work at the cost of the locality, and the Board
of Agriculture can do the same in its own special
matters ; but this power is now never employed.
The Elementary Education Act of 1870 enabled
the Board of Education to appoint a School Board
in any place where the elected authority neglected
its work, but that power was abandoned in the Act
of 1902. Since then, however, the Education (De-
faulting Authorities) Act, 1904, has authorised the
Board to take the place of local education authori-
ties in given circumstances, so far as the receipt of
government grants and their allocation to individual
schools is concerned.
But with this exception the only decisive action
a department can take is to invoke the aid of the
ordinary courts of justice, by application for an
order {mandamus) directing the recalcitrant local
authority to do the acts hitherto neglected by it.
The actual working of this system will be con-
sidered later : here it is necessary merely to point
out that the courts do not grant the order as a
matter of course, but only when convinced that
the department is correct in its interpretation of
the law. And, further, that once the order has been
THE CENTRAL AUTHORITIES 55
issued, the conflict is no longer between the local
authority and the department, but between the
local authority and the courts, which are concerned
solely with the interpretation and enforcement of
the law. This at once saves the department from
the odium which it might otherwise incur, and at
the same time protects the local authority from
any arbitrary interpretation of the law by the
department, and prevents the growth of bureau-
cratic government in England to the stature to
which it has attained in continental Europe.
There can be no question that some of the central
departments, particularly the Local Government
Board and the Board of Education, are over-
burdened with administrative detail, and that in
many respects the work of supervision is over-
centralised. The Local Government Act, 1888,
(section 10) authorised the Local Government Board
to make Provisional Orders transferring to county
councils " any such powers, duties, and liabilities
of her Majesty's Privy Council, a Secretary of State,
the Board of Trade, the Local Government Board,
or the Education Department, or any other govern-
ment department, as are conferred by or in pur-
suance of any statute, and appear to relate to
matters arising within the county, and to be of an
administrative character ; " and such transference
can now be made to a single county council. This
] tower has hitherto not been used at all — a depart-
mental committee considered proposals for devolu-
tion in 1898, but nothing was done, mainly because
of the opposition of the municipalities, who asserted
that elective bodies, such as county councils, would
56 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
not be as impartial as a central departmental
authority, and that moreover the Local Govern-
ment Board possessed more expert knowledge and
could therefore give more valuable advice than any
county council. Nevertheless the existence of this
power of devolution offers an easy means of decen-
tralisation, even if the relations of the municipalities
to the Local Government Board remain unchanged.
The county councils already have some measure of
authority over rural district and parish councils ; it
would not be very difficult to enlarge this authority
in these cases, and to extend it to the urban districts
also. The Local Government Board might thereby
be relieved of much routine work, and it should
also be possible now to mitigate the strictness and
minuteness of the central control over the poor
law administration. As regards education, now
that large and important local authorities have been
established to take charge of all elementary schools,
it should not be difficult to diminish the amount
of detailed work which has hitherto been done by
the central office. The departments should be
required to deal (so far as possible) only with large
questions and important authorities.
CHAPTER V
PUBLIC ASSISTANCE
The term " public assistance " used upon the conti-
nent is in many ways preferable to the English term
"poor relief," since it enables us to include under
one head provision for the destitute, and help for
defectives, sick, and others to whom it is desirable
that help should be given, but who may not be
included amongst those who are commonly called
" the poor." This public assistance in England is
divided between two sets of authorities, the councils
of counties and of certain municipal boroughs and
the Boards of Guardians — the latter being much the
more important.
A. County and Municipal Councils
All county councils, and the councils of all county
boroughs and twenty-seven other quarter sessions
boroughs, are required to provide adequate accom-
modation for pauper lunatics, and, if they think fit,
for lunatics who are not paupers. For this purpose
they may act separately, or two or more may com-
bine ; they may provide asylums themselves or may
contract with the managers of any asylum for the
reception of patients chargeable to the local autho-
rity. Where a local authority, or group of authori-
se
58 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
ties, provides an asylum, it is bound to appoint a
" visiting committee," which has considerable inde-
pendence of action. A contribution towards the
cost of each lunatic is paid by the Poor Law Union
to which he is chargeable. The painfully rapid in-
crease of lunacy, especially in the great cities, is one
of the most serious phenomena of this generation,
and has brought a considerable strain upon local
administrators, who have found it difficult to keep
pace with the demand for asylum accommodation.
On the 1st of January 1885 (the first year in which
criminal lunatics were excluded from the returns)
the number of lunatics relieved was 71,370 ; by the
beginning of 1894 it was 82,875 ; and this figure had
increased by 1904 to 106,683.
Another duty which the county councils, or the
councils of municipal boroughs with 10,000 inhabi-
tants, may take upon themselves is the provision or
assistance of reformatory and industrial schools.
B. The Boards of Guardians
The poor law administration is the department of
English local government which is most strictly
controlled both by legislative enactment and the
orders of a central authority. The Poor Law
Amendment Act of 1834 and subsequent Amending
Acts have been described as "the least permissive
in character " of all the local government statutes ;
and on the foundations which they laid an elaborate
structure has been built, not by the initiative or
enterprise of the local authorities, but entirely by
the direction and on the plans of the Poor Law
PUBLIC ASSISTANCE 59
Commissioners appointed to work out the details
of the Act of 1834, and by their successors, the
Poor Law Board and the present Local Government
Board.
The statute of 1601, which is the basis of our
poor' law system, made the parish the unit for relief
of every kind ; but the ordinary parish was far too
small to be satisfactory for administrative purposes,
and the Act of 1831 authorised the combination of
parishes for the maintenance of the poor. A " poor
law union " may indeed still be a single parish, but,
as its name implies, it is commonly a group of
parishes (the average number being 22) : there are
657 unions in all, including the 10 "contributory
(out-relief) unions" and the Scilly Isles, and they
differ greatly in area and population. The boun-
daries of the unions originally had no regard what-
ever to the boundaries of areas for other purposes
(e.g. municipal boroughs, sanitary districts, or even
counties), and they are still largely independent of
them — a fact which introduces a quite unnecessary
element of confusion into the local government
organisation. The authority in each union is the
Board of Guardians, holding office for three years.
Poor law administration is the only general matter
of local administration for which the ad hoc prin-
ciple is still maintained in law ; but in practice this
lias been modified greatly by the fact that separate
stions of guardians take place only in urban
unions or the urban portions of mixed unions.
Elsewhere the persons elected as rural district
councillors are ipso facto guardians for their elec-
toral areas ; so that, in the not very frequent case
60 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
where a poor law union and a rural district are
conterminous, the two authorities are identical in
composition, though distinct in law and working.
Women are eligible both as district councillors and
guardians, and as the work of the poor law authori-
ties affords especial opportunities for them, many
have been elected and do valuable service. Each
Board of Guardians may, if it chooses, elect a chair-
man and vice-chairman from outside, and it may
also co-opt two other persons.
The guardians (as was noticed in a previous
chapter) have some duties not directly connected
with poor law administration ; but their main task
is the giving of relief. This is of two kinds — out-
door and indoor. Outdoor relief consists of (a)*
gifts in money; (b) gifts in kind; (c) provision of
work for the able-bodied ; (d) apprenticeship ;
(e) medical assistance ; (/) burial. Indoor relief
is given by means of (a) the casual ward; (6) the
workhouse; (c) the infirmary; (d) the lunatic
asylum, maintained as we have seen by another
authority ; (e) the schools. The guardians have
the right and duty of determining in each in-
dividual case the nature and amount of relief to
be given — if it shall be indoor or outdoor ; but that
may almost be described as the extreme limits of
their independence. In all that relates to the
conduct of business, the provision and minute
management of workhouses, infirmaries, and schools,
the dietary of paupers (as to both the nature and
quantity of each meal) every possible matter is
regulated by the Local Government Board as the
central poor law authority. This regulative power
PUBLIC ASSISTANCE 61
is secured first by the right to issue orders, of
which some are general, and apply to all Boards
of Guardians, and others special or applicable only
to the Board or Boards specified in the order ; some
hundreds of such orders are issued every year.
The central department is kept informed of the
action of the authorities by its poor law inspectors,
each of whom has charge of a district, in which
he can attend the meetings of the guardians, and
visit the workhouses and other institutions, as often
as he pleases. Further, the officials of each union —
the clerk, poor law medical officer, relieving officers,
workhouse officers — are appointed and paid by the
guardians ; but the terms of appointment, the ap-
pointments themselves and dismissals must receive
the sanction of the Local Government Board, which,
on the other hand, can dismiss any official without the
consent of the guardians. Finally, there is the audit
of accounts, and the powers connected therewith.
The main purpose of this regulative power and
extreme centralisation, as established in 1834, was
to secure a uniform standard, economy, and order
after the confusion, inefficiency, waste, and de-
moralising influence of the old poor law adminis-
tration. That object was completely attained; no
greater revolution can well be imagined than the
change wrought by the Act of 183-i, and the work
of the Poor Law Commissioners. But it is worthy
of consideration if the system of centralisation then
established has not lasted long enough : and with-
out relaxation of the general principles of poor
relief hitherto adopted, and with the retention of
the inspectoral authority of the Local Government
62 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Board, it would yet be possible to give greater
flexibility to the system by the abolition of the
minute and detailed control which, by reducing
the independence of the guardians to a minimum,
is undoubtedly largely the cause of the general lack
of interest in the Boards of Guardians and their work.
This does not mean that the Boards are necessarily
of inferior quality ; but the feeling that there is little
scope for initiative and responsibility (except as re-
gards the choice between indoor and outdoor relief —
though this is of great importance) and that the
officers are not subordinate to, but largely indepen-
dent of, the elected members, does tend to discourage
candidature, and to promote popular indifference.
It may be that the time has come to abolish the
ad hoc bodies entirely, and to transfer the work
to the town councils for the municipal areas, and
elsewhere to the county and district councils. In
the municipal boroughs there is no reason why
the town councils should not have charge of the
whole of public assistance, working through special
committees — as the German town councils do with
great success. In the counties the county councils
might undertake the provision of the institutions
for indoor relief, which would thereby be much
larger than at present (itself an administrative ad-
vantage), and leave outdoor relief to the district
councils under their supervision and control.
The Methods of Public Assistance
It has already been remarked that the guardians
have the very important duty of deciding in each
PUBLIC ASSISTANCE
63
case between indoor and outdoor relief; and the real
problem always under discussion is the extent to
which these two forms should be used for the able-
bodied. The Outdoor Prohibitory Relief Order of
1844 directed that " every able-bodied person ....
requiring relief .... shall be relieved only in the
workhouse of the union ; " but to this there was
the great exception that out-relief was permitted
for the able-bodied " in all those cases of distress
which are of most frequent occurrence, such as
sickness, accident, bodily or mental infirmity in
themselves and in their families," and further cases,
such as various periods of widowhood. The net
result of this and other provisions is that out-
relief may be given to persons over sixty years
of age, even if still able-bodied, and also to per-
sons under sixty, if disabled by any causes such
as those indicated. The following table gives
the mean number of ordinarily able-bodied adults
in receipt of the two forms of relief in the last
five years : —
Year ended
Lady Day.
Indoor
Relief.
Ratio per
1000 of
Population.
Outdoor
Relief.
Ratio per
1U00 of
Population.
1900
1901
1902
1903
1904
3 1,387
33,580
35,095
37,5G1
39,991
1-1
10
11
1-1
1-2
59,268
57,553
59,580
61,393
62,5(i:)
1-9
1-8
1-8
1-9
1-9
Thus the greater number of able-bodied are re-
lieved outside the workhouse, but the preponderance
is far less than it used to be. The following table
64
ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
shows the average numbers for three quinquennial
periods : —
Period.
Average Number
Receiving In-
relief.
Average Number
Receiving Out-
relief.
1880-4
1890-4
1900-4
21,893
26,971
36,113
81,411
69,105
60,062
In relation to population there has been a steady
decrease of able-bodied paupers from 4-6 per 1000 in
1879-80 to 31 in 1903-4 (a figure somewhat higher
than in the four preceding years).
We may now take in order the various ways in
which relief is given. In out-relief, weekly allow-
ances in money or in kind may be made by the
guardians, but they may not pay rent, redeem tools,
or buy clothes (except in special cases), and they may
not give relief to able-bodied persons, except under
the circumstances already noted. But they may,
by special permission, provide for the able-bodied
under the regulation that " every able-bodied person,
if relieved out of the workhouses, shall be set to
work by the guardians and be kept employed under
their direction and superintendence so long as he
continues to receive relief." This might be used, as
was probably intended, to meet periods of trade
depression and non-employment, but the difficulty
of finding satisfactory work has been so considerable
that few Boards of Guardians make use of their
powers in this matter; it is obviously much easier
for the municipal and district councils to provide
PUBLIC ASSISTANCE 65
employment. Boards of Guardians may also pay
premiums for children to be bound as apprentices.
Another form of out-relief which is very import-
ant is medical assistance ; each Poor Law Union has
one or more medical officers whose duty it is "to
attend duly and punctually upon all poor persons
requiring medical attendance, and supply the re-
quisite medicines whenever it may be required by an
order of the -guardians, or of a relieving officer, or of
an overseer." The receipt of medical assistance (in
or out of the infirmary) does not disfranchise; all
other forms of relief do involve the loss of the
suffrage. Finally, there is burial " by the parish."
The crudest form of in-relief is the casual ward,
which gives a night's shelter to vagrants in return
for a compulsory amount of work. But the most
important is that furnished by the workhouse,
though the title has come to be somewhat of a
misnomer, since the number of able-bodied male
inmates is very small, the great majority of the
workhouse population being the disabled, either by
age or infirmity, and women and children. In
theory, there should be a division of inmates into
various classes {e.g. aged and infirm, able-bodied,
married persons, children, &c), but this is obviously
possible only in the large unions, the ordinary work-
house of a country union being too small — for this
purpose the larger areas already suggested are de-
sirable. And so far it has also proved impracticable
to distinguish between the deserving and unde-
serving poor. The only satisfactory attempt, at
special treatment (apart from the children) has
been in the provision of special comfort for the
E
66 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
aged. For the sick poor there is the infirmary,
practically a parish hospital — not always in a satis-
factory condition, though there has been a consider-
able improvement in this respect in recent years ;
and for the mentally afflicted there is the asylum,
maintained by the county or borough authorities
with contributions from the Boards of Guardians.
Finally, much valuable work is done in the rescue
of children by the provision of poor law schools.
There is the school in the workhouse itself, which
is objectionable because it keeps the children in
the atmosphere of pauperism ; there are the large
" barrack schools," maintained sometimes by a com-
bination of unions ; there is the boarding-out system
— an arrangement which can work well only if great
care is taken in the selection of the homes, and con-
stant inspection secured ; and finally there are the
" cottage homes," where a small village of cottages
is built around a schoolhouse and workshops, and in
each cottage a number of children are placed under
the care of a workman and his wife. Of all these
plans the last is probably the most satisfactory in
its results ; but it is also much the most costly.
The work of enquiry into the circumstances of the
applicants for relief is supposed to be done by the
guardians themselves; actually they are guided
mainly by the reports of their professional agents,
the relieving officers, whose duty it is to receive " all
applications for relief . . . and to forthwith examine
into the circumstances of every case by visiting the
house of the applicant, and by making all necessary
enquiries, &c, and report the result of such enquiries
in the prescribed form at the next meeting." The
PUBLIC ASSISTANCE 67
relieving officers may give immediate aid, if they
think necessary; but the definite decision is made
by the guardians themselves, who commonly require
the applicant to appear before them. Outdoor relief
is distributed by the relieving officers. This is one
of the weakest parts of the system : the relieving
officers are often overworked, and in any case pro-
fessional enquiry into applications for relief is always
apt to become routine and unsympathetic. Little
volunteer help has hitherto been placed at the dis-
posal of the guardians ; the local committees of the
Charity Organisation Society have latterly done
something to remedy the deficiency, but much more
aid of this kind is required. The great success of
what is known as the Elberfeld system (but which
is common throughout Germany) has been due to
the fact that the local authorities for Public Assist-
ance have enlisted the services of large numbers of
persons interested in social work, who under the
carefully maintained control of the authorities are
the agents for enquiry into applications and for the
distribution of relief. There seems no adequate
reason why such an arrangement should not be
adopted in England as part of a re-organisation,
which must soon be undertaken, of our system of
poor relief.
The Cost of Poor Relief
The cost of the- relief of the poor and of the
other duties laid upon the guardians is borne in
each union by a common fund, to which the various
component parishes contribute in proportion to their
68 ENGLI
rateable value; the only items connected in any
way with poor relief which are still chargeable to
separate parishes are the salaries of assistant over-
seers and rate collectors. The cost of asylums
(less a contribution for each inmate from the union
to which he is chargeable) is borne in each asylum
area by the county or borough rate. In London
there are thirty unions with very varying social
conditions ; and in order to remedy to some extent
the inequalities of burden the Metropolitan Common
Poor Fund was established, out of which there is
provided the cost of district asylums for sick and
insane, dispensaries, vaccination, and fivepence a
day for each indoor pauper. The poor rate gene-
rally is relieved by state grants (through the
county councils) from the Exchequer Contribution
Account towards the salaries of officers of unions
and of district schools, and four shillings for each
pauper lunatic. It should be added that the
guardians may recover, if possible, the whole or part
of the expenditure on relief to any person from
that person's husband, wife (if she has separate
property), parents, grandparents, children, or grand-
children, all of whom are liable for the maintenance
of the person relieved.
The total number of persons in receipt of relief
on the 1st January 1904 was 869,128, divided as
follows (573 persons are counted twice over in the
following figures) : —
Ordinary Paupers, Men . . . 197,278
„ „ Women . . 329,846
„ „ Children under 16 222,690
PUBLIC ASSISTANCE
69
Insane, Men
•
. 46,581
,, Women .
I
. 55,838
„ Children under 1 6 .
,
1,834
Vagrants ....
•
. 15,634
Of the total number of 869,128 paupers 136,413, or
15*6 per cent., were in the metropolis.
The next table gives the total expenditure by the
Boards of Guardians on poor relief for the year
1902-3, and the way in which it was met : —
Expenditure.
■ - i
Receipts.
In-maintenance .
£2,920,556
Poor rates . . . £9,658,940
Out-maintenance .
2,932,745
County grants of
Lunatics ....
2,196,318
various kinds
Salaries, super-
(including
annuation, &c. .
2,259,276
£744,256 for
Repayment of loans
maintenance of
and interest . .
1,005,565
lunatics) . . . 2,039,397
Other expenses
From relatives . . 393,291
connected with
Grant from Ex-
poor relief . .
£
1,533,863
chequer (Agri-
cultural rates). 434,078
Other sources . . 322,627
12,848,323
£12,848,334
Whilst the proportion of paupers of all kinds
to population has been steadily falling (it was 28*8
per 1000 at the commencement of 1884, 26'5 in
L894, and 25*1 in 1904), the cost of pauperism has
been rapidly rising — largely because of the greater
Btandard of comfort adopted for indoor relief and
the necessity of increasing provision for lunatics.
The following table gives the cost per head of all
classes of paupers, and the cost per head of outdoor
70
ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
paupers — the latter item being exclusive of the
remuneration of poor-law officers : —
Year ended at
Lady Day.
Cost per Pauper
of all kinds.
Cost of Out-relief
per Pauper so
Relieved.
1871
1881
1891
1901
1902
1903
£7 12 Of
10 4 10*
11 7 Oj
14 15 74
15 6 Oj
15 12 3§
£4 6 QJ
4 13 11
4 12 2f
5 10 l|
5 12 111
5 14 10$
In England and Wales (exclusive of London) the
cost per pauper in the year ending at Lady Day,
1903, was £13, 6s. 5|d. ; in London it was £28, Os. lOd.
Outdoor relief (exclusive of salaries) cost £5, 14s. 5d.
per head outside London, and £5, 19s. lOfd. per
head in the metropolis. The cost of poor relief per
head of population varies greatly ; in 1903 it was
highest in London, with 15s. 8^d. per head ; then
came Herefordshire with 9s. 8|d. and Norfolk with
9s. 2|d., whilst at the other end of the list were
Cumberland and Northumberland with 4s. 9|d. and
4s. 8£d. respectively. The average for the whole
of England and Wales was 7s. 9|d., as compared
with 6s. 3£d. in 1893, 6s. 4£d. in 1883, and 6s. 8d.
in 1873.
CHAPTER VI
EDUCATION
The creation of a national system of education
began in 1833, when the first reformed House of
Commons voted £20,000 to be used "for the pur-
poses of education." At that time the greater part
of the elementary schools of England and Wales
which were of any value were maintained by two
associations — the National Society, which was devoted
to the interests of the Established Church, and the
British and Foreign School Society, which was
almost entirely Nonconformist. The Treasury re-
cognised these two bodies, and followed their advice
in the distribution of the grant, which was used for
the building of schools, on condition that half the
cost was met by voluntary subscription. From
that time onward much attention was given to the
subject, and in 1839 the first really decisive step
was taken by an Order in Council which established
a special committee of the Privy Council, under
the Lord President, to administer the grants; all
schools in receipt of public money were to be sub-
ject to inspection by the new authority. Year by
year after that date the grants for elementary
education were increased, and were accompanied
by grants to institutions founded by private societies
(chietly denominational) for the training of teachers;
71
72 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
the pupil teacher, " Queen's scholarships," and certi-
fication systems were founded ; the Science and
Art Department developed ; and in 1856 the central
authority was re-organised, and a Vice-President
appointed, who was intended to be the real Minister
of Education. But in spite of all this, progress was
very slow ; a Royal Commission reported in 1861
that only about one-seventeenth of the children of
the poor were receiving an education which could
be deemed satisfactory, even with the low standard
of that time. The recommendations of this Com-
mission are interesting in view of recent legisla-
tion; it proposed the institution of county and
municipal Boards, with power to levy rates. But
for nine years nothing was done ; and then came
the great Elementary Education Act of 1870.
That Act directed that " there shall be provided
for every school district a sufficient amount of
accommodation in public elementary schools for all
the children resident in that district, for whose
elementary education efficient and suitable provision
is not otherwise made." Where such provision was
not made by voluntary effort a representative
" local authority was to be set up to make good the
deficiency, and with power to levy a rate for that
purpose ; School Boards might be established also
in other districts, if the schools already provided
were made over to them. In the schools so main-
tained by local authorities no formulary or creed
distinctive of any particular denomination was per-
mitted to be taught. At first attendance at school
was compulsory only in districts where the School
Boards chose to make bye-laws to that effect, but by
EDUCATION 73
legislation in 1876 and 1880 the compulsion was
made universal, and in districts where no School
Board existed the Town Councils of municipalities and
elsewhere the Boards of Guardians were required to
appoint committees to enforce the Acts. As an almost
necessary consequence of this compulsory atten-
dance there came the abolition of school fees in
1891.
Meanwhile, state action in the matter of secondary
and technical education had slowly developed. The
Science and Art Department was doing good work
in the encouragement of the teaching of those
subjects ; the Royal College of Science had been
founded in 1851 ; and in 1889 the Technical Instruc-
tion Act authorised the council of any county or
borough, or any urban sanitary authority, to supply
or aid the supply of technical or manual instruction,
and to levy a small rate for that purpose. In the fol-
lowing year the Local Taxation (Customs and Excise)
Act made over to the local authorities a large annual
sum (the " whisky money ") from the proceeds of
certain duties, with a general recommendation that
the money should be used for technical education —
a term which in subsequent years received a very
wide interpretation. For Wales (which, in regard to
elementary education, is in the same position as
England) the Intermediate Education Act, 1889,
authorised the councils of counties and county
boroughs to contribute to secondary (as distinct from
merely technical) education. Finally, all the state
did for tertiary education, apart from its great science
schools at South Kensington, was to contribute annu-
ally, from 1889 onward, towards a number of institu-
74 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
tions recognised as giving education of a university
type, but the total amount so voted each year for
England and Wales was only about £40,000 up to
1902.
Finally, it should be added that the committee
of the Privy Council was turned into a Board of
Education, with an independent President, in
1899, and its authority was extended in various
ways (in the matter of educational endowments
it took over some of the powers of the Charity
Commissioners).
By 1902 the necessity for reform had become
evident. The change made by the legislation of that
year (and its extension to London in 1903) is so
recent that it is not possible to describe the actual
working of the new machine^. All that can be
done here is to give an account of the condition of
national education in England and Wales in 1902,
and then an outline of the new organisation.
Condition of National Education in 1902
In 1902 there were 2564 School Boards, with 5878
schools; and there were also 14,409 "voluntary"
schools, i.e. schools founded by voluntary (mainly
denominational) effort, and not subject to the control
of locally elected bodies. But in spite of this great
difference in the number of schools, the scholars
were nearly equally divided, there being 3,074,149
in the voluntary schools, and 2,778,127 in the Board
schools, which were chiefly in the towns and popu-
lous districts and were therefore usually much larger
than the voluntary schools. The School Boards
EDUCATION 75
spent in the financial year 1902-3 £11,186,697 out
of ordinary revenue, and £2,312,051 out of loans;
of their ordinary revenue about 59*5 per cent, was
derived from local rates, and about 36-5 per cent,
from Exchequer grants. In the early years after
1870 the friends of the denominational schools had
made great efforts to provide schools, but as the
standards of school curricula and equipment rose
voluntary contributions towards the maintenance of
these schools had proved inadequate, and the state
had been forced to make special grants to them,
until in 1902 rather more than 80 per cent, of their
total income was derived from government moneys,
although they were still managed (subject to the
Board of Education) only by the unrepresentative
denominational managers. Many of the small School
Boards were not very efficient, and some of the volun-
tary schools were extremely good ; but nevertheless
the general level of the voluntary schools, mainly
owing to lack of funds, was below that of the Board
schools.
With the consent of the Board of Education, the
School Boards had widened greatly the sphere of
their activity. In the evening continuation schools,
they gave instruction to adults and others in sub-
jects of elementary education and in more ad-
vanced studies; in higher grade day schools, they
were teaching subjects which wore really part of
secondary education, and they maintained centres
for the special instruction of pupil teachers. But
though this had .-ill developed with the approval
and encouragement of a government department
it was discovered in 1900 and 1902 to be abso-
76 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
lutely illegal, since instruction to adults, the teach-
ing in pupil teacher centres, and some of the
subjects in the evening continuation and higher
grade schools, were held by the courts to be outside
the term "elementary education."
Meanwhile, much of the advanced work of the
School Boards had overlapped the technical in-
struction given by the county and municipal
authorities. Only in Wales and Monmouth had
the local (county and county borough) authorities
power to contribute to secondary education, in the
broadest meaning of the term, and in 1901 they
maintained or contributed to ninety-five secondary
schools. In England, however, the term " technical
education" had been given a very wide interpre-
tation, and there were very few subjects which
could not in some way be brought within it ; most of
the authorities under the Technical Instruction Acts
had taken the matter up vigorously, and very much
valuable work had been done. The total amount
spent by them on technical and intermediate edu-
cation in 1902-3 was £1,455,422. The Department
of Science and Art had also contributed powerfully
to the development of the teaching of those subjects
by grants to institutions subject to inspection.
As regards the training of teachers, the action
of the state had been confined to the recogni-
tion, financial assistance, and inspection of training-
colleges for elementary teachers, founded by private
or university enterprise, and these were altogether
inadequate in number. In 1902, 5846 candidates
qualified for admission to these institutions, but
there were vacancies only for 2800. For the train-
EDUCATION 77
ing of secondary teachers the state naturally, since
it did nothing for secondary schools, made no
provision whatever.
So that by 1902 more than half the children in
public elementary schools in England and Wales
were in the "voluntary schools," where they re-
ceived an education inferior to that given in the
Board schools. Four-fifths of the income of the
voluntary schools was derived from the national
exchequer, but they were nevertheless not subject
to any local representative authority, and in them
religious teaching of a denominational character
was given. There were 7478 districts with only
a single school each, and though the " conscience
clause" enabled parents to withdraw their children
from the religious instruction of which they dis-
approved, that course is not always easy or desir-
able. For secondary education (so far as state
action was concerned) there was no general system ;
the local authorities were legally powerless except
for technical subjects; there was no co-ordination
of elementary with advanced education, or of the
work of the technical education authorities with
that of the evening continuation and higher grade
schools, up to 1900. Finally, the local authorities
were unable to render any assistance to tertiary
education, except to such parts of it as could be
brought within the term " technical " ; there was
no means of co-ordinating secondary with tertiary
education, apart from such influence as might be
exercised indirectly by the universities. The exist-
ing ureas for education purposes were far too small
for anything to be done, even hud the authorities
78 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
the power, for the building up of a coherent system
which should embrace all three grades of education.
As to teaching, the state imposed some minimum
qualifications for teachers in inspected elementary-
schools, but scarcely half the teachers were ade-
quately trained, since no obligation rested upon
anybody to provide institutions for that purpose.
The New System
The basis of the Act of 1902 is the adoption of
the plan of county and municipal education areas,
which had been recommended in 1861, and the
abandonment of the ad hoc system, which even
in 1870 had not at first been intended to apply to
the great towns. For elementary education the
authorities now are the councils of all counties and
county boroughs, of municipal boroughs with 10,000
inhabitants, and of urban districts with 20,000 in-
habitants. The same authorities, and the councils
of all other municipal boroughs, and urban districts
(whatever their size), may supply or aid the supply of
" higher education " ; this is denned simply as mean-
ing " education other than elementary," and so the
disability of local authorities from contributing to-
wards secondary (as distinct from technical) and
tertiary education is removed — -there is in fact no
restriction whatsoever. Any municipal borough or
urban district can hand over any powers of which
it may be possessed to the local county council.
Every authority must appoint a " local education
committee " (or committees), to consist partly of coun-
cillors and partly of co-opted persons, representative
EDUCATION 79
of educational bodies, or interested in education,
amongst whom women must be included ; except
in cases of emergency no authority may come to a
decision on any educational matter except after
receiving a report from this committee ; whilst, on
the other hand, a council can, if it think fit, hand over
to its education committee any or all of its powers
under the Act of 1902, and in that case the com-
mittee can act as if it were the council, except as to
levying a rate or raising a loan. All the old board
schools are transferred to the new authorities, and
further, they are to have control of secular education,
including equipment and staffing, in the voluntary
schools; the two groups are to be known hence-
forward as " provided " and " non-provided " schools.
In the case of a provided school there are managers,
of whom two-thirds are appointed by the education
authority, and one-third by the local authority if it
is not itself the education authority ; if it is, then
it appoints all the managers. For non-provided
schools the managers are appointed as to two-thirds
by the trustees or the old foundation managers, and
as to one-third, half by the local education authority
and half by the immediate local authority — e.g. in
rural areas the parish councils. The education
authority has absolute control of provided schools ;
in the others the managers are bound to carry out
its instructions in all that relates to secular edu-
cation; it has power to inspect, and its approval
is required for the appointment and dismissal
of teachers, but such approval cannot be withheld
merely on religious grounds. In provided schools
no religious creed or formulary distinctive of any
80 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
denomination may be taught ; in non - provided
schools religious instruction may be given in accord-
ance with the trust deeds, but parents may with-
draw their children from such instruction. The
only financial responsibility resting on the managers
of non-provided schools is the supply of buildings ;
if these are not sufficient at any time, and the
managers cannot extend them, the local education
authority may either make the extension, and
thereby turn the non-provided into a provided
school, or it may establish a new school. For
higher education the authorities may do whatever
they choose ; they may establish institutions of their
own, either jointly or separately, or they may con-
tribute to institutions already in existence, for any
kind of secondary and technical education (includ-
ing evening schools), for the training of teachers,
and for the promotion of education of a university
type. The only restriction is the limitation of the
rate for higher education to twopence in the pound
(except with the approval of the Local Government
Board) in county and county boroughs, and to one
penny in the pound in non-county boroughs and
urban districts. It is too soon yet to judge of the
use which will be made of all these powers, but
there are abundant signs that the new authorities
are taking up their work with energy and with a
real desire to promote a sound system of national
education.
What, then, has been gained by the Act ? There
are the larger areas; over 2500 school boards and
800 school attendance committees have been replaced
by 328 education authorities — councils of 62 ad-
EDUCATION 81
ministrative counties.. 69 county boroughs, 138 muni-
cipal boroughs, 58 urban districts, and of the Isles
of Scilly. There is the possibility of raising the
standard of all primary schools to an equality ; the
beginnings of popular control over all schools in
receipt of public money ; the opportunity for a state
system of secondary education, in the fullest sense
of the term, and for greater state participation in
university education; the possibility of substantial
improvements in the training of teachers, and the
general co-ordination of the three grades of educa-
tion. Much will depend upon the action of the
universities, and the extent to which they can make
their influence felt ; and for this the omens are favour-
able, since local authorities are contributing to the
new universities, and these in turn are represented
upon the education committees, are undertaking
the training of teachers, and are proposing to in-
fluence secondary schools by inspection (on behalf
of the Board of Education) where desired, and by
the institution of "leaving examinations" with cer-
tificates which admit to the universities without
further examination. In this way, even if no further
changes of organisation are made, we may hope that
the time will come when each university, whilst
open to students from all parts, will yet have its own
special area in which it will be the guiding force in
all branches of education and the crown of the whole
system. This is what is aimed at, and largely at-
tained, by the " regional " universities of France ;
but in England and Wales the same result could
probably be secured without so inelastic an organi-
sation as prevails in that country.
82 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
The Act of 1902, in spite of the many reforms
which it has made, has been subject to the severest
criticism. The abolition of the school boards has
been opposed on the ground that education is so
important that it should be given to an authority
which could devote its whole time to the matter,
and be composed of persons specially interested and
qualified. No one will deny the great value of the
work done by the school boards of the large towns ;
but the average rural school board was not very
effective, and against the disadvantages of the aboli-
tion must be set the advantages of larger areas,
greater public interest (since experience seems to
show conclusively that the ordinary elector is inter-
ested least in ad hoc authorities), the strengthen-
ing of county and municipal councils, and the
concentration of financial responsibility. The ob-
jection that the new Act establishes the principle
of rate-aid without representation is scarcely valid,
since it at least inaugurates popular control over all
schools. The further objection that it stereotypes
the system under which public money is given to
denominational schools, and that teachers not of
the Established Church are excluded from the chief
posts in the great majority of the public schools, is
much more serious, since it has aroused an amount
of opposition which must hamper the administration
of the Act. But the validity of the objection, and
the possible remedies, are questions too controversial
to be discussed here.
The whole of elementary education, and of science
and art instruction, in schools and institutions in
receipt of public money, is controlled by the Board
EDUCATION 83
of Education. It prepares the code of regulations
for elementary schools, inspects them, and allots the
parliamentary grants ; it lays down regulations as to
the number, qualifications, and training of teachers,
examines, certifies, and registers them, and inspects
the training colleges which are aided by grants ; it
decides as to the necessity of new schools. If an
authority fails to fulfil any of its duties under the
Elementary Education Acts, the Board may proceed
against it by application for the writ of mandamus.
It must be consulted by any authority which pre-
pares a scheme for the promotion of higher educa-
tion ; and its approval is required for all courses of
instruction in science and art for which central
grants are claimed. Finally, it may inspect secondary
schools desiring to be so inspected ; the number of
these is increasing rapidly, and reached 135 in the
year 1903.
The Cost of Education
The total amount to be voted by Parliament for
education of all kinds in the United Kingdom
in the year 1905-6 is £16,328,947, which is about
thirteen times as much as was voted in 1870, and
about £6,000,000 more than in 1895-6. The grants
for elementary and science and art education, and
the administrative expenses of the Board of Edu-
cation in England and Wales, rose from about
£7,500,000 in 1895-6 to £12,650,000 ten years later.
The average grant per day scholar (on average
attendance) in the elementary schools was 10s. If d. in
1871, and by 1903-4 it had risen to 20s. 5£d. it is not
84 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
possible to give exact figures of the total amount
spent on elementary education, since no complete
statistics are published ; but the expenditure of the
school boards in 1902-3 was 13| million pounds, and
for the voluntary schools it could not have been less
than 8 millions, which, with the addition of the
administrative expenses of the Board of Education,
gives a total of at least 22 million pounds, almost
entirely from (public central and local) funds for
elementary education alone. Adding to that the
science and art and university college grants, and the
money spent by local authorities on technical edu-
cation, we get to nearly 26 millions, and there cannot
be the slightest doubt that this figure will be very
much increased by the working of the Act of 1902,
by the efforts of the new local education authorities
to bring all the elementary schools to a level, to
provide and stimulate (by increased salaries) the
supply of teachers, and to promote secondary and
tertiary education.
CHAPTER VII
PUBLIC HEALTH
Public attention was first seriously drawn to the
necessity of measures for promoting and safeguard-
ing the health of the community by the letter on
preventable disease as a cause of poverty, which the
Poor Law Commissioners addressed in 1838 to the
Home Secretary. The next ten years were occupied
with parliamentary and other enquiries, and an
awakening of public interest in the matter (stimu-
lated by cholera epidemics) ; and then the Public
Health Act of 1848 inaugurated a series of experi-
ments by erecting a Central Board of Health, with
power to establish local boards in districts which
desired them or which had a high death-rate. But
the new central authority was from the first unsatis-
factory and unpopular — partly because of defects of
organisation and inadequate powers, and partly be-
cause its methods were not well advised in view of
the reaction against central control. The Board was
effective only for live years; after that it languished
until its abolition in 1858. Subsequent action by
the legislature up to 1870 failed to produce a satis-
factory code of sanitary law, partly because of the
disinclination of the legislature to couch its enact-
ments in the imperative mood ; there was only
86 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
insufficient central guidance and supervision, and
much confusion of authorities.
Then, as the result of the labours of a Royal
Commission in the years 1869-1871, there came
reform, first by the establishment of the Local
Government Board in 1871 and the transference to
it of the powers and duties exercised by various
departments (particularly the Privy Council) in
matters of public health. Next, in 1872 the country
was divided into urban and rural sanitary districts ; in
the former the town councils of municipal boroughs,
and elsewhere the improvement commissioners esta-
blished under local Acts, or local boards of health
specially elected, were to be the authorities ; in the
rural districts the sanitary administration was en-
trusted to the guardians of the poor. Three years
later the great Public Health Act of 1875 gave
England and Wales a sanitary code by the consolida-
tion, amendment, and extension of the previous
sanitary enactments ; to a large extent the new Act
was compulsory on all authorities, and much more,
though generally optional, was to be compulsory if
the Local Government Board so decided. Since 1875
the sanitary laws have been extended almost every
year ; the constant recognition of new needs has
greatly increased the work, and thereby the import-
ance, of the authorities concerned. These, as now
constituted, are the creations of the Local Govern-
ment Acts of 1888 and 1894 ; and are, for the county
generally, the county councils, urban district councils,
and rural district councils ; and for the metropolis, the
London County Council, the Metropolitan Asylums
Board, and the metropolitan borough councils. The
PUBLIC HEALTH ' 87
principal sanitary enactments at present in force are
the Public Health Act, 1875, the Public Health
(Amendment) Act, 1890, the Housing of the Working
Classes Act, 1890, and its amending Acts of 1900 and
1903, and the Public Health (London) Act, 1891 ; but
there are many others of various degrees of importance.
The Authorities and their Powers
A. The County Councils. — The council of each ad-
ministrative county is charged with the surveillance
of the sanitary administration within its area (except
in municipal boroughs), and for that purpose a
medical officer is usually appointed to watch the
work done by the various authorities and report
thereon to his council. On his report it may make
representations to the Local Government Board as
to the action of any local sanitary authority, or under
section 16 of the Act of 1894, on the complaint of a
parish council that a rural district council is neglect-
ing its duty in regard to sewerage, or water supply,
or other matters under the Public Health Acts, the
county council may hold an enquiry, and then either
take over the duties itself, or authorise some person
or persons to do the work, at the expense of the
defaulting authority. As a matter of fact, it usually
makes representations to the authority concerned, and
if they fail it invokes the aid of the Local Government
Board. This surveillance, exercised chiefly through
the medical officer, is of great importance, for the
central department could not adequately watch over
the numerous district councils. The medical officers
of the counties are usually men of very considerable
88 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
qualifications and ability, and their annual reports
are in many cases documents not merely of interest
for the study of sanitary administration, but of im-
portance as contributions to scientific knowledge.
There are a few other duties of county councils.
They may, and if required must, appoint public
analysts under the Sale of Food and Drugs Acts,
and must appoint agricultural analysts under the
Fertilisers and Feeding Stuffs Acts, 1893; they
must form committees to carry out the directions of
the Board of Agriculture in regard to the diseases of
animals, and they may establish isolation hospitals
under an Act of 1893.
B. The Councils of Sanitary Districts. — From the
point of view of sanitary legislation, the country is
divided into urban and rural sanitary districts — the
former including all municipal boroughs and the
urban districts established in 1894, and the latter
being the rural districts. The authorities are then
town councils, urban district councils, and rural
district councils. The powers of parish councils
are confined to the making of representations as to
the sanitary condition of their parishes to the proper
authorities, the removal of petty nuisances, the utilisa-
tion of existing sources of water supply, the provision
of recreation grounds and cemeteries, and lighting.
It will be convenient to summarise the powers
of the authorities first, and then to examine them
in detail. There are some which are common to
the authorities of both groups of districts, whilst
naturally there are others which normally are
needed for urban areas only. But the Local Govern-
ment Board may give a rural district council any
PUBLIC HEALTH 89
or all of the powers of an urban district council if
it think fit, and this is constantly done — in 168
cases in the year 1903-4. It should also be added
that whilst many of the powers and duties to be
mentioned are always compulsory, others are op-
tional unless the Local Government Board think
proper to direct authorities to take them up.
Generally, then, urban and rural sanitary author-
ities alike have powers and duties in regard to —
(1) Sewerage and drainage.
(2) Provision of water supply.
(3) Inspection and prevention of nuisances.
(4) Inspection and regulation of lodging-houses and
cellar dwellings.
(5) Registration and inspection of workshops and
domestic factories, including bakehouses and
laundries.
(f>) Collection and removal of house refuse.
(7) Provision of hospitals, mortuaries, cemeteries and
crematoria.
(8) Regulations in regard to infectious diseases.
('.•) Inspection of food.
(10) Inspection of dairies.
(1 1) Regulations as to the conduct of offensive trades.
(12) Provision of houses for the working classes.
( 1 ."')) Provision of open spaces.
(14) Regulation of buildings.
(15) Lighting.
Urban sanitary authorities have powers also in
regard to —
(16) Cleansing and scavenging of streets (this is very
commonly given to rural authorities also).
H7) Provision of baths and washhousi
(IS) Town improvements.
00 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
The councils of the more important municipal
boroughs are also authorities in respect of —
(19) Sale of food and drugs — appointment of analysts.
(20) Diseases of animals.
(21) Fertilisers and feeding stuffs — appointment of
agricultural analysts.
C. The Sanitary Authorities in London. — The
London County Council is the authority for the
general supervision of the sanitary work of the
metropolitan borough councils, and for the Acts re-
lating to diseases of animals, slaughter-houses, and
common lodging-houses. It is responsible for the
main drainage system; it carries out all important
street improvements ; it is the principal authority
under the Housing Acts; it may make bye-laws
applicable to the whole of London for the regulation
of offensive trades, and for the removal and pre-
vention of various nuisances ; and it may provide
parks and open spaces. Neither it nor the borough
councils have anything to do with the water supply,
except that they appoint representatives on the
Metropolitan Water Board. For all other matters,
cleaning and lighting of streets, sanitary inspection,
small housing schemes, &c, the metropolitan borough
councils are the authorities. The Corporation of the
City has charge of the sanitary administration of the
port of London ; and hospitals for infectious diseases
are provided by the Metropolitan Asylums Board.
The Officers of Sanitary Authorities
Every sanitary authority must appoint a medical
officer and one or more sanitary inspectors, and
PUBLIC HEALTH 91
county councils and the councils of certain municipal
boroughs appoint analysts. In the case of medical
officers and sanitary inspectors an attempt has been
made to secure for them higher standards of qualifica-
tion and salary, and security of tenure, by the regula-
tion that the local authorities appointing them may
receive from the Exchequer Contribution Account
half their salaries, on condition that the Local
Government Board approve the qualifications,
method of appointment, and salary, and ratify the
appointments made. In 1904 the medical officers
of 1667 districts (991 urban, 633 rural, 43 port) had
been so appointed, and the sanitary inspectors of
1607 districts (920 urban, 643 rural, 44 port). In
the metropolis 30 medical officers and 304 inspectors
held office under these conditions. But in fact the
object of the arrangement, which is not compulsory,
has not been attained ; the working of the Exchequer
Contribution Account, as will be seen later, is such
that there is no advantage whatever to the councils
of counties and county boroughs in accepting these
terms — their control over their officials is diminished,
and they get no financial benefit in return ; as a con-
sequence of this practically none of them make
appointments under these conditions. The great
majority of other authorities do get financial assist-
ance, but as they are naturally unwilling to give up
complete control of the persons appointed, they have
managed to procure the approval of the Local
Government Board for conditions of appointment
which do, in fact, destroy that security of tenure
which the plan was partly at least intended to
obtain.
92 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
The appointments of analysts must in all cases be
approved by the Local Government Board.
Public Health Powees of the Local
Government Board
The powers of the Local Government Board as the
central authority for public health are not as great
as those of the same department in poor law matters,
but nevertheless they are very important. Perhaps
the chief task of the Board is to give advice and
guidance to all local sanitary authorities, sometimes
by circular on its own initiative, sometimes in reply
to questions from particular bodies. For this
purpose there is a staff of medical inspectors, and,
in order to place their expert knowledge further at
the disposal of the subordinate authorities, in addition
to the information given in the manner indicated,
central and local conferences with representatives
of the latter are held from time to time. Moreover,
the inspectors hold frequent enquiries which are
sometimes a matter of routine (as into the adminis-
tration of port sanitary authorities), and sometimes
special (as into epidemics). These enquiries may be
followed by recommendations and advice to the local
authorities concerned, or in rarer cases (where there
has been actual neglect of duty) by directions.
The Board's approval is required for a large
number of actions proposed to be taken by local
authorities, such as the formation of special drainage
districts and joint burial boards, housing schemes
outside London, the purchase of gasworks, the ac-
quisition or establishment of waterworks, the appoint-
PUBLIC HEALTH 93
ment of officers whose salaries are to be charged
partially on the Exchequer Contribution Account,
the appointment of public analysts, and bye-laws in
regard to such varied matters as hackney carriages,
hop and fruit pickers, lodging-houses, recreation
grounds, pleasure boats, public libraries, locomotives,
water supply, streets and buildings, slaughter-houses,
and swings and shooting galleries. In the majority
of cases borrowings by local authorities for sanitary
purposes require approval from the Board, which
holds a local enquiry by its medical or, more usually,
engineering inspectors — in 1903-4 the latter held as
many as 1058 enquiries under this head alone. The
Board has the power also of giving to rural sanitary
authorities any or all of the powers of urban authori-
ties ; and it may direct any authority to undertake
duties which under the Public Health Acts are com-
pulsory only at the discretion of the Board. Thus sec.
42 of the Public Health Act, 1875, orders that "every
local authority may, and when required by order of
the Local Government Board shall, themselves under-
take or contract for the removal of house refuse from
premises " ; and sec. 141 that " any local authority
may, and if required by the Local Government Board
shall, provide and fit up" mortuaries. The Board
constitutes port sanitary authorities ; it has general
powers to make orders finding on all authorities in
case of plague ; it arbitrates in disputes between
local boards; it inspects alkali works, and examines
the quality of London water supplies; it watches the
enforcement of the Vaccination Acts by the poor law
guardians, and maintains a laboratory for the supply
of pun: lymph ; it has Bpecial duties in regard to the
94 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
registration and regulations of canal boats used as
dwellings. It collects annual reports of the local
medical officers, which are compulsory for some
matters, and publishes a valuable and elaborate
annual report by its own chief medical officer.
It is the duty of the Board to enforce the per-
formance by the local sanitary authorities of the
duties laid upon them by parliamentary enactments.
On complaint from any source that a local authority
is neglecting to fulfil its duties, or any part of them,
under the Public Health Acts, the Board, if satisfied
on enquiry that there has been such neglect, and if
the local authority will not amend its ways, may
either apply to the High Court of Justice for a writ
of mandamus directed to the defaulting authority,
or it may direct some person or persons to perform
the neglected duty, at the expense of the local
authority (Public Health Act.. 1875, sec. 299).
Under sec. 106 of the same Act the Board, in the
case of default by the local authority in regard to
certain nuisances, may direct the local police to
act, so far as to take any legal proceedings which
the local authority might have instituted, and to
recover the costs of such proceedings from the local
authority, if not paid by the person proceeded
against. Cases of such administrative action are
now extremely rare, though it was occasionally
necessary in the early years of the Board's history,
and applications to the Court for the writ of man-
damus are very infrequent — there was no instance
of either kind in 1903-4 ; enquiry and pressure by
the Board is usually sufficient to bring about the
desired result. But it will be observed that the
PUBLIC HEALTH 95
Board can take such steps only where there is
actual neglect of duty ; where there is merely in-
efficiency it can do nothing except hold enquiries,
pillory local authorities by publishing the reports
of the medical inspectors, and generally bring to
bear such influence as it possesses. Much of the
supervisory work is now given over to the county
councils, but a remonstrance from the central and
more distant authority is often far more effective
than one from the local body whose members are
perfectly well known.
CHAPTER VIII
PUBLIC HEALTH— (continued)
A. General Sanitation
It is the duty of the local sanitary authorities to see
to the sewerage and drainage of their areas, and for
that purpose they may themselves provide sewers,
or purchase them if already made, and maintain
sewage disposal works ; divisions and combinations
of districts may be made for these purposes. They
must also take care that houses and factories are
kept in proper sanitary condition and may make
bye-laws to secure that result ; they must watch for
the existence of any nuisance (that is, anything in-
jurious to health) both within and without houses,
and take the steps necessary to bring about its
abatement. For this constant inspection is neces-
sary, and therefore the local authorities, by any of
their officers, have powers of entry into any pre-
mises at reasonable hours on showing reasonable
cause. As part of its authority to prevent nuisances,
the consent of an urban sanitary board is required
for the establishment within its district of any of
certain " offensive trades," and it may make bye-
laws " to diminish the obnoxious or injurious effects
thereof." Every local authority may, and if required
by the Local Government Board must, provide for
96
PUBLIC HEALTH 97
the removal of house refuse; and the council of
every urban district may, and if required must,
undertake the proper cleansing of the streets. This
latter power is very frequently conferred on the
councils of rural districts also. All sanitary autho-
rities may supply lighting, or contract for its supply,
either by gas or electricity and they may then
provide it for private buildings of all kinds ; and
parish councils, with the approval of their parish
meetings, may undertake the lighting of their
areas.
In order to prevent the spread of infectious disease
the local authorities are bound to secure the dis-
infection of houses where there has been such
disease, and they may make any regulations and
take any action which they think expedient in this
matter. County councils may themselves establish,
or direct subordinate authorities to establish, isola-
tion hospitals, and districts may, by order of the
Local Government Board, be combined for this
purpose. To the same end, local authorities may
make bye-laws to secure cleanliness in cowsheds,
dairies, and milkshops, and to prevent the pollution
of streams and the use of unwholesome drinking
water. It is curious, however, that an important
part of the prevention of infectious disease, the
enforcement of the Vaccination Acts, is still left to
the Boards of Guardians. Urban and rural districts
may provide mortuaries, cemeteries, or crematoria ;
and parishes may provide burial-grounds either
separately or in combination. Under a long series
of parliamentary enactments, the local sanitary
authorities are entitled to make sanitary bye-laws.
Q
98 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
This power they use freely, and in the year 1903-4
alone, the Local Government Board sanctioned no
less than 500 series made under the various Public
Health Acts, most of them being based on the
model series prepared by the Board.
For sewage and cleaning purposes, and for the
promotion of public health generally, nothing is
more important and necessary than an abundant
water supply ; and the local authorities may them-
selves provide this, either by establishing works or
by acquiring works already in existence. Conditions
in England have tended to bring about, in a great
number of cases, the municipal ownership of the
supply ; it has often, especially for the great towns,
to be brought from a long distance. Manchester
brings its water from Thirlmere (95 miles away),
Birmingham from North Wales, and Liverpool from
Lake Vyrnwy (68 miles distant). This involves an
expenditure so great as in many cases to prevent
the enterprise from being remunerative unless prices
are charged which would tend to diminish con-
sumption ; and as this is undesirable, municipal
and other authorities are sometimes compelled to
undertake the supply at a loss which is borne by
the public rates as a part of the expenditure upon
sanitation. Urban sanitary authorities and parish
councils may provide public baths and wash-
houses.
As regards the English sanitary system, it may
be said that in most of the large towns it is ad-
mirable, and that in a large number of the smaller
urban areas and rural districts it is very good ;
and there can be no doubt that the general level
PUBLIC HEALTH 99
of English public health administration, urban
and rural, is considerably higher than that of
any other country. But much remains to be done
— there are backward authorities ; and without
amendment of the law (which on the whole is
sufficient) great progress could be made if the
Local Government Board would only exercise a
constant and unremitting pressure, not simply on
authorities actually in default, but on all whose
death-rate, for example, was above a certain point.
More sanitary inspectors are needed, and many
more women should be appointed.
B. Inspection of Factories and Workshops
The enforcement of the enactments in regard to
factories and workshops is in the main the duty
of the Home Office, acting by means of its large
staff of inspectors, but since 1891 there has been
an effort to make use of the local sanitary autho-
rities, by transferring to them the supervision of
the sanitary conditions of workshops and domestic
factories. Up to 1901 the attempt was not very
successful, mainly owing to the defects in the law,
such as the insufficient powers given to local
authorities (who had no satisfactory means of
obtaining information as to the existence of the
places they were required to inspect), the over-
lapping of these with the functions of the cent ml
inspectors, and the absence of any adequate control
on the part of the Home Office over the local
councils.
The great consolidating Factory and Workshops
100 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Act, 1901, made a serious effort to remedy this
condition of affairs. Textile and non-textile factories
are to be supervised solely by the Home Office
inspectors, whilst the local sanitary authorities
are given charge (so far as sanitary conditions are
concerned) of " domestic factories " (i.e. " private
dwelling-houses where only members of the family
carry on without mechanical power " certain occu-
pations specified in the schedule of the Act), " work-
shops " (" places where work is carried on for gain
without the aid of mechanical power," including
hand laundries), and " workplaces " (a vague and
general term which includes such places as stable
yards and restaurant kitchens). The local sanitary
authority is required to keep a register of all work-
shops, to enforce numerous sanitary regulations,
to see that proper provision is made in all factories
for escape from fire, to receive lists of out-workers
in certain trades, to see that no work is given out
to be done in any place which is " injurious or
dangerous to the health of the persons employed
therein," and to prohibit for a time and for certain
occupations (especially the making of wearing ap-
parel) the use of places in which there is, or has
recently been, any infectious disease. The medical
officer of each sanitary district is required in his
annual report to deal specially with the adminis-
tration of the Act, and this part of the report must
be sent to the Home Secretary. Lastly, under the
Employment of Children Act, 1903, the local autho-
rity may make bye-laws as to the employment of
children under fourteen years of age generally,
and of persons under sixteen for street trading.
PUBLIC HEALTH 101
C. Housing
Of recent years no problem of public health has
attracted so much attention as Housing, which is
a difficulty (though arising from different causes)
in town and country alike. In the effort to secure
decent and sufficient accommodation, there are three
distinct matters which need attention— (i.) the es-
tablishment and maintenance of the sanitary con-
dition of existing houses, (ii.) the prevention of the
rise of new slums, (hi.) the actual provision of house
room.
The first of these is attained to some extent under
the ordinary Public Health Acts. Thus, under
the Act of 1875, a local sanitary authority, in ad-
dition to the inspection already described, must
supervise cellar dwellings, and prevent the use
of any which were not so used at the time of the
passing of the Act ; it must keep a list of all
common lodging-houses and their keepers, make
bye-laws as to their conduct, and enforce certain
special sanitary regulations ; and it may make bye-
laws against overcrowding. If a nuisance exists
such as to make a house, in the opinion of a court
of summary jurisdiction, unfit for habitation, then
the court, on application of the local authority, may
prohibit its use until put in proper order. But
it may be that it is practically impossible for this
to be done, and for such cases the local authorities
an- given special powers by Parts I. and II. of the
Housing of the Working Classes Act, 1890. Under
that Act, if the medical officer, either on his own
initiative or on the complaints of ratepayers, reports
102 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
that within a certain area of the district of a local
authority " any houses, courts, or alleys are unfit
for human habitation ; or the narrowness, closeness,
and bad arrangement, or the bad condition of the
streets and houses or groups of houses within such
area, or the want of light, air, ventilation, or proper
conveniences, or any other sanitary defects, or one
or more of such causes, are dangerous or injurious
to the health of the inhabitants either of the build-
ings in the said area or of the neighbouring build-
ings," then the local authority (subject to the
approval of the Local Government Board, or in
London of tho Home Office) may make an improve-
ment scheme. For that purpose it may purchase
the area so condemned (both land and houses),
compulsorily if necessary, at the fair market value,
without regard to enhanced rentals due to over-
crowding ; and if it is proved that the houses " are
unfit and not reasonably capable of being made
fit for human habitation," then the price is to be
only the value of the land and the materials thereon.
The land once acquired, and the buildings upon
it demolished, the authority can dedicate it as an
open space, or it can lay out new streets, and then
either lease or sell the land for the erection of work-
ing-class dwellings, or itself erect dwellings. In any
case, accommodation must in London be provided
for at least one-half the number of persons dis-
housed by any such improvement scheme; else-
where the number is fixed in each case by the
Local Government Board. Part II. of the Act
enabled a local authority to order the closing and
demolition of single houses or small groups of
PUBLIC HEALTH 103
houses either because of their insanitary condition,
or because they are " obstructive," i.e. render resi-
dence in other buildings unhealthy by stopping
ventilation or preventing sanitation.
Much has been done by urban authorities under
Part I. Up to 1904 the London County Council
has displaced 16,421 persons and re-housed 13,161.
Between 1891 and 1902 21 town councils and 1
urban district council made improvement schemes,
and a more recent case is at Bolton, where the
town council has been authorised to clear an un-
healthy area of 961 square yards. Under Part II.
of the Act in the year 1903-4 authorities outside
London received complaints as to 4251 houses ; of
these 2230 were put into proper condition without
closing orders being issued, 791 were closed or
demolished by the owners voluntarily, 617 were
closed compulsorily and 81 compulsorily demolished.
Seven authorities outside London have made im-
provement schemes under Part II., and twelve in
London with the aid of the London County Council.
These powers are to enable the sanitary adminis-
tration to deal with existing areas; to prevent the
rise of such areas there are the bye-laws in regard
to buildings, which the local authorities are autho-
rised to make with the approval of the Local
Government Board, and such special enactments
as the London Building Act, 1894. The regulations
made under these powers deal with many varied
details, such as the height of buildings, width of
streets, amount of air space in rooms, thickness of
walls and nature of materials employed, and sanitary
equipment generally. The bye-laws of the great
104 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
towns are usually quite satisfactory, and for the
guidance of authorities generally, and especially of
the smaller and rural authorities, the Local Govern-
ment Board issues model bye-laws. The enforcement
of the building clauses of the Public Health Acts,
and the stringency of the regulations actually made,
depend entirely on the interest and energy of the
local authorities ; and there is evidence that they
err in many cases rather on the side of over-severity,
and that the adoption, especially by rural authorities,
of the model bye-laws without sufficient regard to
local conditions, has seriously increased the cost of
building operations and discouraged builders, particu-
larly in the rural districts.
In spite of all that has been done under these
powers, it has been thought desirable to go further,
and to authorise local authorities themselves to
supplement private enterprise in the provision of
house accommodation. This is a development
peculiar to Great Britain; practically nowhere else
have the authorities themselves undertaken the
supply of houses — they have confined themselves to
stimulating private enterprise and smoothing its
path. But Part III. of the Act of 1890, and its
amendments in 1900 and 1903, authorised the
County Council in London, and any town or urban
district council elsewhere (and any rural district
council with the approval of its county council) to
acquire land (within or without its own adminis-
trative area) and build houses thereon. It may
contract for the purchase or lease of any lodging-
house already, or hereafter to be, built or provided;
or it may convert any existing buildings into lodg-
PUBLIC HEALTH 105
ing-houses — a term defined as including "separate
houses or cottages for the working classes, whether
containing one or several tenements." All schemes
need departmental approval ; loans may be raised,
and the Act of 1903 extended the maximum period
of repayment (which is, however, seldom allowed)
from sixty to eighty years. Some seventy authori-
ties have so far adopted Part III. and its amend-
ments, and have taken various steps ; for example,
the London County Council has initiated schemes
to house nearly 70,000 persons, Manchester has
housed over 2700, and the corporations of Liverpool,
Plymouth, Sheffield, Hull, Salford, Southampton,
West Ham, and Wolverhampton have all carried
out schemes of varying extent.
Yet municipal housing has so far not given un-
mixed satisfaction, and there are some signs of reac-
tion against the movement. Complaint is made that
the rents charged have usually been so high as to
be beyond the reach of the poor ; that this has
been due in part to the limited period (prior to the
Act of 1903) for the repayment of loans, and to the
severity of the building regulations, but in part
also to the unnecessarily elaborate character of the
buildings erected. It is certain that when a clear-
ance has been made, and new dwellings erected,
the persons dishoused have seldom returned to the
area; tiny have gone to make matters worse else-
where Moreover, in housing enterprises where a
profit is made, if the rents are competitive the local
authority is a wholly unnecessary rival to private
builders; if the rents are non - competitive, then
unless the municipality houses its whole population,
106 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
a favoured class is created, securing better accom-
modation at the saiue rent as the rest of the in-
habitants, or equivalent accommodation at a lower
rent. This is still more the case where the rents
are unremunerative ; then a favoured class is estab-
lished at the cost of the general ratepayer. If the
housing schemes provided for the very poor, this
would be defensible, but hitherto they have not
done so. The only adequate justification for munici-
pal housing is that it forms part of public health
administration ; it will be that, only when it pro-
vides simple and cheap accommodation for the
very poor, and (with strict surveillance) for the
"undesirables" who are turned out of their abodes
by the vigorous enforcement of the sanitary law.
Apart from this, the most effective means of dealing
with the housing problem, so far at least as the
towns are concerned, seems to be the development
of swift and inexpensive means of transit and com-
munication, which will enable the population to be
spread over larger areas, and factories to be moved
further and further out from the urban areas. But
that question must be discussed separately.
D. Protection of Food Supply
This is strictly a part of the ordinary sanitary
administration for preventing the rise or extension
of disease, but merits special notice. Under section
116 of the Public Health Act, 1875, any medical
officer or sanitary inspector " may at all reasonable
times inspect and examine any animal, carcass, meat,
poultry, game, flesh, fish, fruit, vegetables, corn, bread,
PUBLIC HEALTH
107
Hour or milk . . . intended for the food of man;"
and if it is " diseased or unsound or unwholesome or
unfit for the food of man," it may be seized by the
officer and condemned by a justice, apart from any
other penalty inflicted on the purveyor or other
person concerned. Section 28 of the Public Health
Amendment Act, 1890, extends this to " all articles
intended for the food of man, sold or exposed for
sale, or deposited in any place for the purpose of
sale, or of preparation for sale." For the purpose of
the analysis of samples taken, or commodities seized,
under these and other powers, the councils of counties
and of certain boroughs must appoint analysts, and
231 have been so appointed. In 1903, 78,077 samples
were analysed, and 6169 (7*9 per cent.) were reported
against ; legal proceedings were taken in 3508 cases.
The following table orives remarkable evidence as to
the effect in this direction of the Sale of Food and
Drugs Acts, and the inspection under the Public
Health Acts : —
Years.
Number of
Samples.
A -\ crape Percentage
Reported Against.
1-77-81
L882 86
1—7 9]
L892 96
L896 1901
83,442
108,864
L34,231
198,713
2 0,166
16-2
13-9
11-7
106
9-0
1902
1903
72,321
78,077
8-7
7-9
Further, in order to prevent the supplies becoming
contaminated, there has been special legislation as
108 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
to dairies, bakeries, and the diseases of animals. In
the case of dairies, which are denned as including
" any farm, farm-house, cow-shed, milk-store, milk-
shop, or other place from which milk is supplied or
kept for purposes of sale," in addition to ordinary
regulative powers, the London County Council in the
metropolis and elsewhere any sanitary authority
which has adopted the Infectious Diseases Preven-
tion Act, 1890, can, on the report of the medical
officer and the veterinary inspector, prohibit, for such
time as it thinks advisable, the supply of milk from
any dairy from which disease has been, or may be,
caused. The Act has been adopted by 674 urban
and about 300 rural authorities. For bakeries local
authorities have powers of inspection under various
Acts, and no new underground bakeries are per-
mitted. Urban sanitary authorities may license
slaughter-houses, under conditions imposed by them,
or they may themselves provide such places ; and
finally the councils of all counties and of boroughs
with 10,000 inhabitants, are authorities under the
Diseases of Animals Acts, and have to carry out all
regulations made in connection therewith by the
Board of Agriculture.
E. Provision of Means of Recreation
A series of Adoptive Acts enables various authori-
ties to make some provision for the physical and
intellectual recreation of the citizens, and this work
may conveniently be treated here as a part of public
health administration. Any urban sanitary authority
and the council of any rural parish may provide
PUBLIC HEALTH 109
public swimming and other baths, and during five
months of each year a swimming bath may be
turned into a gymnasium. Much use has been
made of this power by urban authorities, and the
transformation of swimming baths into gymnasiums
during the winter months is very common. Another
enactment, the Museums and Gymnasiums Act,
1891, enables urban sanitary authorities to provide
gymnasiums, and to levy for that purpose a rate
not exceeding one halfpenny in the pound ; and up
to 1904 it had been adopted by 42 authorities.
The greatest amount of work in the supply of
opportunities of recreation has been done by local
authorities both by clauses in the Public Health Acts
and special legislation, enabling them to provide and
maintain parks and open spaces. Any urban council,
and any rural district or parish council, with the
consent of the Local Government Board, may pur-
chase or accept and manage land for parks, open
spaces, public playgrounds, and promenades. Many
of the larger urban authorities have acquired similar
powers under Private Acts ; in 190o the outstanding
debt of local authorities incurred for these purposes
was £7,586,000, and the expenditure on maintenance
was £707,543.
The provision made for intellectual recreation con-
sists mainly of libraries, museums, and art galleries.
The Public Libraries Act, 1892 (which consolidates
previous legislation), may be adopted in any urban
area or rural parish, and under it libraries, museums,
and art galleries may be established. The rate to be
levied may not exceed one penny in the pound, but
in a few cases this limit has been removed by clauses
110 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
in private Acts. Up to 1904 the Act had been
adopted by 181 urban and 35 parish councils, and
similar powers were employed in at least 177 other
urban areas under earlier legislation and in 21
metropolitan boroughs. The Museums and Gymna-
siums Act, 1891, had also been adopted, so far as it
relates to museums, by 58 urban authorities.
CHAPTER IX
(I.) TRANSIT.— (II.) PROTECTION OF LIFE AND
PROPERTY
(I.) Transit
Oxe of the most pressing tasks of local adminis-
trators at the present day is the provision or control
of facilities for transit adapted to modern needs.
It is a social problem, since the supply of cheap
and rapid means of transit, enabling the worker to
live at some distance from his place of employ-
ment, seems likely (together with the removal of
industries to the country districts, which depends
also on easy transport) to be the only effective
means of relieving the congestion of population
in the towns. It is an administrative problem,
for the discovery of the bicycle and the motor,
and the development of the electric tramway,
have not only brought the roads again into use
for long-distance travelling, but have also raised
serious quest inns both of road construction and
of the control of traffic. So far the action of
local authorities has been limited to two things
— the making and maintenance of highways and
streets, and the provision of tramways and light
railways.
112 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
A. Highways and Streets
In England and Wales the maintenance of all
ordinary roads has always been a local duty ; whilst
until about the middle of last century the great
roads were usually managed by trustees and sup-
ported by tolls. In the nineteenth century there
was much legislation on the subject, beginning
with the Highways Act of 1835, and ending with
the Local Government Acts of 1888 and 1894,
which made the arrangements now in force.
Highways outside county boroughs are divided
into two classes — main roads and district roads.
The former include a number of what were once
turnpike roads, and other highways declared by
the county authorities to be main roads, " by reason
of their being mediums of communication between
great towns," or on other grounds. These are
maintained and repaired by the councils of the
counties through which they pass, but any urban
authority was authorised to claim, within a certain
period after the passing of the Act of 1888, or
within twelve months of a road becoming a main
road, to take over the maintenance and repair of
such main roads as fell within its area, in return
for such annual payment from the county council
as may be agreed upon, or settled by arbitration.
Further, a rural district council may do the same,
if the county council permits; but it has no right
in the matter. In 1903 the total length of main
roads in England and Wales was 27,223 miles, of
which 16,580 were maintained by the county
councils directly; 7068 by the rural district councils,
TRANSIT 113
and 3575 by urban authorities, under the con-
ditions which have been described. The urban
councils make very full use of their right, since
they have taken over these 3575 miles out of
4010 within their areas. It rests entirely with the
county councils to determine what shall be main
roads, and whilst some of them have taken over
almost all the roads of importance, others have
limited the " maining " of roads as much as
possible. There is no appeal from their de-
cisions.
District roads are the smaller highways outside
the urban areas ; they are administered by the rural
district councils at their own cost, though a county
council may, if it think fit, contribute thereto.
This has been done in many cases, subject usually
to the condition that the state of the roads towards
which the contributions are made must be certi-
fied as satisfactory by the county surveyor. In
1903 the rural district councils were responsible
for 94,978 miles of road.
Urban authorities maintain their streets entirely
at their own expense ; the councils of county
boroughs are charged also with the upkeep of
such portions of main roads as fall within the
borough boundaries. In London the highway autho-
rities arc the twenty-eight metropolitan borough
councils and the Corporation of the city. Urban
authorities may take over new streets made by
private enterprise, and may enforce the sewering
and paving of streets which they do not take
over; they may make street improvements, and
for that, purpose may acquire land compulsorily,
ii
114 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
as may any authority for the making of new roads
or the widening of those which already exist.
So that altogether there are about 1884 highway
authorities of one kind and another in England and
Wales. Their total expenditure, not out of loans, on
actual maintenance was in the financial year 1902-3
£10,234,332 ; and to this must be added some
£2,800,000 for interest and repayment of loans, and
a further £7,000,000 expended out of new loans for
highways and street improvements (including the
amount spent for this latter purpose by the London
County Council). It should be added that these
figures include amounts spent on bridges, for which
county and municipal councils are responsible.
It is generally admitted that the highway system
of this country is not in a very satisfactory state,
so far as its organisation is concerned. In the first
place, there are too many small authorities, and
there is no means provided for securing the co-ordin-
ation of the highway schemes of the various areas.
In the case of many of the ordinary district roads
this is not of very great importance ; but it is always
advisable that the system of one authority should
link on as simply and easily as possible to those of
its neighbours — and this is especially so with great
cities and the areas around them. For the main
roads it is most desirable that there should be uni-
formity of construction so far as practicable, and it is
clear that when such a road as the Great North
Road from London to Edinburgh is controlled by 72
distinct authorities, the desired uniformity is hardly
likely to be attained. It is also without doubt true
that since many of the small councils have compara-
TRANSIT 115
tively little mileage to maintain, they are scarcely to
be expected to do the work so well or so cheaply as
authorities with large areas which justify them in
keeping skilled and permanent highway staffs; the
result is unavoidably a certain amount of waste, alike
of money and energy. And finally, owing to recent
scientific developments so many of the great roads
are becoming of national use, and are subject to so
much wear and tear, that it is hardly possible to
continue to throw on the localities through which
they chance to pass the whole cost of their upkeep.
When the Portsmouth road, for instance, is so greatly
used by travellers from and to London, it is scarcely
fair that the whole burden of its maintenance should
be borne by the rural counties in which it falls. In
this respect the theory of the turnpike roads — that
the users should pay for them — was sound, though
inconvenient and harassing in practice. As a return
to that arrangement is impracticable, the alternative
plan is to throw on the National Exchequer the
whole or part of the cost of those roads which may
fairly be called " national."
A Departmental Committee of enquiry into high-
way administration, made in 1903 a report which
contained a number of suggestions for reform. It
recognised that the maintenance of roads is so
important a part of the work of the rural district
councils, and receives so much attention from them,
that they cannot well be deprived of it. But the
committee recommended that for main roads there
should be (geographical) county highway boards,
representative of all the authorities which have at
present rights and duties in regard to main road
116 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
this in order to get rid of a number of inconveniences
and difficulties which arise at present from the
division of work between the county and urban
district councils, and to secure the co-ordination of
the systems of the administrative counties and the
county boroughs in their midst. If such authorities
were set up, even only as Boards of control, it would
be easy to give them powers of supervision over the
work of the district councils, so as to secure that
their systems connected properly and in the most
convenient way, both with one another and with
the main roads.
Lastly, the committee recommended that there
should be a government grant towards those roads
which could reasonably be deemed of national utility ;
a special division of the Local Government Board,
possibly aided by an advisory committee, should
administer the grant, determining to what roads it
should be given, and requiring in return a certain
minimum standard of efficiency of maintenance. This
would be a movement in the direction of the plan
which has been so successful in France, where a
great network of main roads — connecting Paris with
the frontier, with the great military and naval
stations, and with the chief cities of the interior, or
uniting the chief towns — is kept up by the central
government, which commonly carries out the work
of construction and repair directly. The arrangement
suggested for this country would secure somewhat
the same results, without that centralisation of the
work which is the chief disadvantage of the French
method.
TRANSIT 117
B. Tramways and Light Railways
The beginning and basis of all general legislation
upon this subject was the Tramways Act of 1870.
It authorised the Board of Trade to grant Pro-
visional Orders (requiring Parliamentary confirma-
tion) to local authorities or private individuals or
companies for the making and working of tram-
ways; but in the case of private individuals or
companies the approval of the authority responsible
for the maintenance of the roads had to be obtained,
and this enabled it to impose terms on the private
undertakers, usually as to workmen's fares, frequency
of cars, &c. — the charge of a rent for the use of
the roads was never allowed. Provision was also
made in the Act for the acquisition of the under-
takings by the local authorities, either by friendly
agreement at any time, or compulsorily at the end
of twenty-one years.
The Act did not exclude procedure by private
Bill, but neither by the general Act nor by private
Bill were local authorities empowered to work tram-
ways; they might construct them, and then they
must either lease them to be worked by a person
or company, or — an impossible proceeding — leave
the tramways open to be used by the public on
payment of tolls. Though there was a little un-
certainty at first as to the policy of Parliament,
all doubt was soon at an end, and until 1882 it
was the recognised rule that no local authority
could be allowed to work its tramways itself — and
so great cities like Manchester, Liverpool, Birming-
ham, and Glasgow (for the Act of 1870 applied
118 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
equally to Scotland) made and then leased their
lines at an annual rental. But the unfortunate
case of Huddersfield, which could not lease the
tramways it had made, induced Parliament to
modify its policy slightly, in the Huddersfield
Corporation Act, 1882, by allowing the Board of
Trade to license the Corporation to work the lines,
if it were satisfied that they could not be leased.
This was immediately done ; but it was not until
1892 that the plan was generalised by an alteration
of the Standing Orders of Parliament to enable the
Select Committee on any Tramways Bill to insert the
" Huddersfield clause " if it thought fit. Then in 1896
the London County Council and the Leeds Corpora-
tion secured Acts which gave them an unrestricted
power of making and working tramways. All restraints
were then abandoned, and since the end of the 1896
session local authorities have been given, both by Bill
and Provisional Order, the right to work tramways
freely, so far as their own districts are concerned.
But it is evident that a tramway system, if it is
to be effective, cannot always stop at the boundaries
of the area which it supplies ; it must often be
carried farther. But as soon as this happens, it
is in the area of another authority ; what are to be
the relations between the tramway-owning authority
and the other ? If the tramways are in the hands
of a private company, there is of course no diffi-
culty ; but where they are owned by a local autho-
rity itself, some difficult questions arise. This
particular problem, which affects the whole matter
of " municipal trading," will be discussed later ;
here it need only be remarked that there are three
TRANSIT 119
alternatives if the tramways are owned by local
bodies — each authority may run its own system,
and the linking of the two be made by agreement ;
there may be a joint board ; or one authority may
be allowed to work both systems. The Tramways
Act contemplated only the first two of these methods,
but the necessities of the situation, especially in
places where one large authority is surrounded by
a number of small urban areas, no one of which
could possibly have tramways of its own, induced
Parliament to amend its Standing Orders in 1893
so as to allow the insertion in private Acts of clauses
empowering local authorities to make and work
tramways in the areas of other authorities, subject
to their consent, and to conditions agreed upon.
The Tramways Act and the various arrangements
made under it gave tolerable facilities for the supply
of the towns and their outlying districts; but it
made no effective provision for the rural portions
of the country. Yet it was obviously desirable that
there should be some means of linking villages
with towns, and of facilitating transit in the country
districts. Accordingly, in 1896, Parliament passed
the Light Railways Act, which provided for the
appointment of three Commissioners by the Board
of Trade. Any county, town, or district council, any
individual, corporation, or company, or any two
authorities jointly, may promote a scheme and
apply to the Commissioners for an order which needs
the confirmation of the Board of Trade, which if the
Bcheme be very large may require it to be submitted
to Purl i an ient as a private Bill. Local authorities
may by such permission construct and work, or
120
ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
contract for the construction and working, of light
railways — which are steam or electric tramways
using the ordinary highways ; they may take shares
in a company, or advance money to it on loan, and
provision is made in that case for the representation
of the authorities on the board of directors. Up to
the present no county council has obtained power
actually to work the lines itself. Though town
councils may promote light railways, the Commis-
sioners refuse to grant orders under this Act for
the construction of lines entirely within the area
of one urban authority, on the ground that such
schemes fall under the Tramways Act.
Local authorities have made great use of the
powers which they have thus received. The follow-
ing table shows the extent of tramway and light
railway enterprise, and the share of local authori-
ties therein, at the commencement of 1904. The
figures are for the whole of the United Kingdom,
but there is only one municipal undertaking in
Ireland (at Belfast) : —
Tramways and
Light Eailways.
Total Expendi-
ture on Capital
Accounts.
No. of Miles
Open for Traffic.
No. of
Under-
takings.
Double
Lines.
768
292
Single
Lines.
Total.
Of Local
Authorities .
Of Private
Companies .
£28,060,524
18,390,920
380
400
1148
692
162
150
Totals . .
£46,451,444
1060
780
1840
312
PROTECTION OF LIFE AND PROPERTY 121
It will be noticed that whilst the numbers of
" municipal " and private undertakings are nearly
equal., the former represent a much greater mileage
of double track. Of the whole 1840 miles, 1162 are
electric tramways or railways, and only 235 are horse
tramways, the remainder being worked by steam,
cable, or gas-motors. This total of 1840 miles com-
pares with 269 in 1878, and 940 in 1890. Moreover,
755 additional miles of double track, and 652 of
single track, had been authorised by March 1904.
On the lines open for traffic the net receipts in
1903-4 were £2,912,110. Thus the work is going
rapidly forward, and there can be no question as to
its beneficent results ; the only doubt is as to the
possibility that, as steam superseded horse power,
and electricity has replaced them both, the appear-
ance of the motor omnibus may not render the
costly permanent way of the present tram-cars
ultimately unnecessary.
(II.) Protection of Life and Property
(a) The present organisation of the police system
dates from 1856, when it became evident that many
authorities would make no use of the adoptive
powers given them by Parliament in 1839. All
counties and boroughs were compelled to maintain
constabulary forces, and the central government
undertook to contribute one-quarter (subsequently
increased to one-hall) of the cost of the pay and
clothing of each force certified as efficient by in-
spectors of the Home Office. Since 1856 the only
changes have been in the constitution of the police
122 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
authority in the counties, and the reduction of the
number of separate constabulary forces by the with-
drawal from the smaller boroughs of the privilege
of independence as police authorities. Thus since
1882 no separate force can be established in boroughs
with less than 20,000 inhabitants, and the Local
Government Act, 1888, transferred the policing of
all boroughs with less than 10,000 inhabitants to
the county authorities ; the same transference can be
made in the case of other boroughs by consent, and
has taken place in a large number of instances.
So that the remaining independent police areas
are the administrative counties and boroughs with
10,000 inhabitants, and not less than 20,000 if in-
corporated since 1882, which have not surrendered
their powers to the county councils. In the
counties the constabulary force is controlled by a
Standing Joint Committee, composed of equal
numbers of representatives of the county council
and of the justices of the court of quarter-sessions ;
the Committee receives its funds from the county
council, and reports to it, but is in administrative
matters independent. It appoints the chief con-
stable, who is answerable for the direction and
disposition of the force, and the clerk of the peace,
who is also clerk to the county council. In the
boroughs with a separate force, each town council
is required to appoint a Watch Committee, for the
control and management of the police ; there is
also a chief constable, appointed by the council.
All police officers are bound to carry out the orders
of the justices of the peace for the county or
borough without reference to the committees.
PROTECTION OF LIFE AND PROPERTY 123
The central authority for police is the Home
Secretary, but his powers are very limited in com-
parison with those possessed by the Minister of
the Interior in any other European country ; he
has no direct control over the local forces. His
approval is needed for the appointments of chief
constables, and for police bye-laws ; and he inspects,
through a staff of special officers, all constabulary
forces, and a certificate of efficiency from him is
necessary before a local authority can obtain the
state grant. The certificate is very rarely with-
held, the mere threat of action to be taken if im-
provements are not made by the next annual
inspection being usually sufficient. Though the
present form of the police grant is bad, yet the
arrangement has on the whole been extremely
successful in promoting the establishment and
maintenance of efficient local forces. The Metro-
politan Police, who administer an area which in-
cludes the administrative county of London, the
county of Middlesex, parts of Surrey, Kent, Essex,
and Hertfordshire, and the Royal Dockyards, are
controlled solely by the Home Office, though the
local authorities bear practically the whole cost.
For one square mile of the city of London, in the
centre of this great area, the police force is main-
tained by the Corporation of the city, and has no
connection with the Metropolitan Police. The
cost of police in l'J02-3 was £5,720,038, of which
£2,117,669 was for the Metropolitan Police alone.
(h) Every county council appoints one or more
coroners, and so do those quarter-sessions boroughs
with more than 10,000 inhabitants which received
124 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
their courts of quarter-sessions prior to 1888. In
this respect county and non-county boroughs are
in the same position.
(c) Fire brigades, or other provision for the pro-
tection of property against danger by fire, may be
maintained by all urban authorities, and by rural
district and parish councils. In London the Metro-
politan Fire Brigade is under the County Council.
The total amount spent under this head in 1902-3
was £475,293, of which £207,504 was expended by
the London County Council, £254,197 by other
urban authorities, and the remainder by rural
district and parish authorities.
CHAPTER X
MUNICIPAL POLICY AND MUNICIPAL TRADING
During the last few years there has been much
controversy as to the action proper to be taken by
local authorities in regard to one particular class
of public services — those, that is, which necessitate
the maintenance of a large and very special plant,
managed by an expert staff, and are generally
capable of being so conducted as to yield a finan-
cial profit. These include waterworks (usually),
gasworks, electric light and power works, tram-
ways of various kinds, and a number of mis-
cellaneous services. All these have usually been
regarded as good commercial undertakings likely to
pay satisfactory dividends, and therefore fit objects
for private enterprise ; and towards them a local
authority may adopt any one of three policies. It
may leave them to private companies, and allow the
companies to go their own way uncontrolled, that is,
to occupy the same position towards the public as a
private trader towards his customers. Or, secondly,
it may impose special obligations and restrictions
upon the companies; it may limit the profits or
charges, enforce regulations as to the quality and
quantity of the commodities supplied, and make
any other conditions which it thinks proper and
the law will allow. Or, thirdly, it may itself under-
lie
126 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
take to supply the services needed, either alone or
in competition with private undertakings. There is
one other policy, midway between the second and
third, whereby the local authority owns the plant
necessary for the service, but leaves the working of it
to a private company, so that it runs no commercial
risk itself. This plan, which, as we have seen, was the
one originally authorised by Parliament for the pro-
vision of tramways, has however rarely been very suc-
cessful, and is generally being given up. The policy
of leaving the supply of the services uncontrolled is
recognised in this country at least as being practically
impossible, and the controversy rages between the
supporters of the second and third alternatives.
In Great Britain the tendency has been for the
services to pass rapidly through the three stages,
and to become completely municipalised — that is,
to be owned and worked by the local authorities.
Councils have been led to adopt this policy by a
number of varied considerations. There was first
the belief, based on practical experience, that com-
petition in the supply of water, gas, electric light,
and means of transit in any particular locality is
often practically impossible, and is always ineffec-
tive ; that in fact all such services tend (for both
economic and administrative reasons) to become
monopolies. If these services were essential to the
well-being of the cities, and unless undertaken by
the councils would be supplied by private companies
which consider primarily only their own interests,
then the councils thought themselves justified in
taking action. This has been the case particularly
in regard to all those services which directly or
MUNICIPAL POLICY AND TRADING 127
indirectly promote public health, such as water
supply, and tramways, which relieve the pressure
on the central districts of great cities. Secondly,
there were administrative reasons connected with
the control of the streets. And, thirdly, there was
the belief formulated by Mr. Chamberlain as Mayor
of Birmingham in 1874, in his speech advocating the
purchase of the gasworks by the Corporation. He
believed that the council of a great city " possessed
a considerable amount of business ability and com-
mercial experience, and that its members were ani-
mated by perfect disinterestedness in their service
to the town. . . . He held distinctly that all
monopolies which were sustained in any way by
the state ought to be in the hands of the repre-
sentatives of the people, by whom they should be
administered and to whom the profits should go.
At present the council had inadequate means for
discharging all the obligations and responsibilities
devolving upon them, and he believed that the pres-
sure of the rates would become intolerable unless
some compensation could be found in such a pro-
posal as that before the council. The purchase
would help to relieve the ratepayers of burdens
which were every day becoming more oppressive."
It should be remarked that this allocation of profits
to the relief of rates does not meet with approval
from all the supporters of municipal ownership. It
is much practised, but there were some witnesses
before the Municipal Trading Committee of 1900
who held that all profits should be used for the
reduction of the prices charged to the consumers ;
and their opinion is summarised by a recent writer.
128 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
who remarks that " the duty of the municipality
is to make as little profit as possible, whereas the
duty of the commercial company is to make as
much profit as possible. An electric lighting
company paying a dividend of ten per cent, is a
triumph of good management ; a municipal electric
lighting committee making profits at the same rate
is guilty of social malversation." The doctrine is
that a municipality should undertake only those
enterprises which promote the objects for whose
realisation the local authorities exist — what has
been called " civic housekeeping " ; that they should
therefore aim at encouraging the consumption of the
largest possible amount of water and light, and the
fullest use of the tramways ; and that consequently
the charges should be regarded, not as prices for a
commodity, but as fees for a service rendered to the
citizens by the local authorities. These fees should
do no more than cover the cost of the service.
There is much to be said in favour of this doctrine,
but it has not received the approval of the great
majority of the authorities concerned. They have
to do much costly work which is altogether un-
remunerative and, to set off this to some extent,
they are naturally anxious to make what profit
they can on other services; and, moreover, the
individual citizen may prefer to pay a trifle more
for his tram rides, or for his gas and water (of which
he can regulate his consumption as he pleases),
rather than be compelled to pay higher rates.
There is, of course, the possible danger that large
profits so used may permit extravagant expenditure
to pass unnoticed by the ordinary citizen, since his
MUNICIPAL POLICY AND TRADING
129
attention is not drawn to it by rising rates ; but so
far it would be difficult to find any actual illustra-
tions of this.
In Great Britain, then, public ownership of public
services has gone very far. In 1902, in England
and Wales alone, according to the latest complete
returns (relating only to municipal boroughs), there
were 193 town councils owning waterworks, 97
owning gasworks, 102 supplying electricity, and
45 working or owning tramways; and there were
numerous other "reproductive undertakings" in-
cluding harbours, piers, docks, municipal dwellings,
and markets, and a number of miscellaneous things
such as canals, ferries, and a racecourse at Don-
caster, owned by local authorities. Many urban dis-
trict councils also have property of these various kinds;
and in the last two years there has been much de-
velopment of public ownership especially in regard
to tramways and electricity. The following table
gives the relative shares of local authorities and
private companies in the supply of the principal
public services of this kind in England and Wales
in 1902-3:—
Service.
Local Authorities.
Companies.
der-
1 lapital Outlay.
Under-
takings.
Capital Outlay.
Wafer . .
Train v.
Ele
788
131
21 13
323
(Not known)
£20,049,000
28,967,000
,000,000
237
L2]
438
145
(Not known)
£13,804, 1
75,471,000
26,000,000
130 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
What is the policy elsewhere? In Prussia, and
Germany generally, it has been either to bring the
services under very strict control, or to municipalise
them. The latter course has been adopted in many
cases ; and it is well to remember that German civic
administrators have not been influenced in the least
by any of those " socialistic ideas " which are so
often alleged to have animated British councils,
but have deliberately adopted municipalisation be-
cause they believed that it would best promote
administrative efficiency. In the United States,
on the other hand, there appears to be no instance
of a city owning and working its tramways, very
few owning gasworks, and only a small proportion
having municipal electric light. But somewhat
more than one-half own their water supply, and for
the other services it is customary to impose more
or less stringent conditions and varying financial
payments in return for what are practically monopoly
privileges granted by the civic authorities to private
companies. The system has worked fairly well,
but nevertheless the greater number of civic re-
formers in the United States are in favour of
municipal ownership.
In the last few years the whole policy has been
fiercely attacked in Great Britain; but the contro-
versy has changed its ground. It is no longer
concerned with a general principle — that is admitted
within limits — but with its particular applications.
There is a consensus of opinion, for instance, that
the water supply should be in the hands of the local
authorities; but once that be admitted, the whole
of the theoretical case against a large part of
MUNICIPAL POLICY AND TRADING 131
municipal ownership is abandoned. For the argu-
ments for a municipal water supply — that it is a
monopoly, because of both the physical limitation
of its amount and the economic and administrative
impossibility of competing supplies in the same area,
and that it is desirable to encourage the consump-
tion as much as possible, and therefore to make
charges which are fees rather than prices — these
apply with nearly equal force to tramways, gas and
electricity supply, and markets. Criticism is then
leaving aside the question of principle and con-
fining itself to the practical problem, which is simply
this — taking all the circumstances into considera-
tion, does the municipalisation of a particular service
present a balance of advantages or disadvantages ?
This involves the separate examination of the
services as rendered under great varieties of con-
ditions; and in the enquiry it must be borne con-
stantly in mind that the choice is not between
municipal action and uncontrolled private enterprise,
but between a municipal service and a private but
controlled service.
The criticisms directed against " municipal trad-
ing " (a misleading term, since the primary object
of municipal ownership is never to obtain an
ordinary business profit), fall into two groups —
the first financial, the second administrative and
social.
To take the financial question first. The Board
of Trade return of 1902 gives the following figures
in regard to the finance of the reproductive under-
takingfl of tho municipal boroughs only: —
12,662,430
132 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Total capital provided (inclusive of
loans) £121,172,372
Capital borrowed .... 117,032,923
Borrowed capital paid off . . . 16,246,519
Outstanding balance of borrowed capi-
tal (1902) 100,786,404
Average annual income (1898-1902) 13,040,711
Average annual expenditure —
Working expenses . £8,228,706"
Interest and repay-
ment of loans . 4,240,450
Depreciation fund . 193,274>
Net Profit . . . 378,281
But these figures need to be used with very great
care. For in the first place amongst these " repro-
ductive " undertakings are included baths and wash-
houses and cemeteries, which ought not to be
included at all, since a loss on them is inevitable.
Further, waterworks are included, and the larger
and more costly of these (as at Birmingham and
Manchester), are often works which no private
company could undertake, and hence on the 193
municipal water supplies given in the return,
though the total capital was nearly 57 million
pounds, the net profit was only £90,000. Further,
in estimating the actual trading profit, it is necessary
not only to add to the net profit the amount of
interest (£2,975,906) paid on loans, the repayment
of capital being equivalent to a contribution towards
a depreciation fund ; but allowance must also be
made for the fact that a large number of municipal
authorities do not credit the accounts of their
enterprises with the full value of the water, gas,
MUNICIPAL POLICY AND TRADING 133
or electricity used for municipal purposes. These
various considerations, and the fact that normally
a municipality does not attempt to charge the
highest prices which the market will bear, cause
any criticism merely from the trading standpoint
of the figures given above to be little more than
a waste of time. To the ordinary trader the
financial result is all-important ; to the munici-
palise^ whilst it is never insignificant, it is not
always the primary consideration. Undoubtedly
there is need for greater caution, and it is probably
true that the financial methods adopted by town
councils have not always been very prudent. Of
recent years they have been too much in a hurry,
with the result that the market has become over-
loaded with municipal securities. They have not
always made adequate allowance for depreciation,
and the repayment of loans has extended over a
longer period than the lifetime of the plant for
which they were contracted; with the result that
they have had to raise new loans, to keep the plant
efficient, before the old ones have been discharged.
The municipalities cannot be expected to provide a
large depreciation fund in addition to the provision
for the repayment of loans ; but the period allowed
for this latter purpose should never, in the case of
reproductive undertakings, be allowed to exceed
the probable duration of the plant.
Where the privilege of supplying any service is
granted to a private company, it is customary
in the United States and Germany for financial
obligations (in addition to other conditions) to be
imposed upon it. These take various forms — rem
134 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
for the use of the streets, contributions towards
their upkeep, and payment to the municipal
authorities of a percentage of the gross or net pro-
ceeds of the undertaking. The idea is that a
monopolistic privilege or " franchise " is given, and
a price must be paid for it. But it is clear that
all such payments form part of the working ex-
penses of the company ; i.e. it must get them out of
the consumers of the commodity which it supplies,
and therefore it must charge the public just so
much more than it need do if such payments were
not made. It may be argued that in any case the
company would get as much out of the consumers
as possible, and it is just as well that some part of
it should go into the coffers of the city. But on
the whole it is clearly preferable that the policy of
the municipal authorities should be, not to do any-
thing which shall give the company an excuse for
high charges, but to secure for the citizens as
efficient and adequate a service as possible. In
Great Britain the privileges are granted by Parlia-
ment, and the local authority's consent is not re-
quired — though a Select Committee will listen to
its representations — except in the case of tramways,
where the Standing Orders of Parliament require
that a private company promoting a Tramways
Bill must prove the consent of the local highway
authority. This gives the authorities power to
impose conditions in return for their consent, and
this is very frequently done. Parliament has never
allowed a rent to be required, and on the whole the
tendency has been to impose comparatively few
directly financial obligations, for Parliament has
MUNICIPAL POLICY AND TRADING 135
always regarded these with distrust, except so far
as they are concerned with the maintenance of
the streets through which the tramways run. Un-
doubtedly there is a slight danger that a local
authority may be unduly harassing and exacting ;
but if the power be wisely used, by the imposition
of reasonable conditions (as to hours of service,
frequency of cars, workmen's fares, &c), it can be
most effective in safeguarding the interests of the
citizens. The same method could be applied to all
services, and there are some reasons why under
present conditions it is preferable to actual muni-
cipal ownership. It has the great merit of giving
the municipality a control which it can use for
the benefit of the citizens, without involving financial
responsibility.
We may pass now to the second group of con-
siderations — those which we have called adminis-
trative and social. Some of those commonly urged
have very little validity. There is, for instance,
the alleged " injurious effect upon work strictly
within the municipal sphere of operation — the fact
that in giving attention to trading operations the
'unproductive' work is almost certain to be neg-
lected." This is one of the arguments which can
only be answered by an appeal to facts ; and there
is no evidence whatever in support of it. In Great
Britain the advance has been in all directions, and
the growth of municipal trading has not been ac-
companied by any decline in the efficiency of such
unproductive work as health administration, but
rather by an improvement.
A more serious set of objections is concerned
136 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
with management. There is, it is alleged, no
guarantee that municipal monopolists will be any-
better than other monopolists, and they may easily
be worse, in the performance of their work. All
monopolist companies tend to be much less enter-
prising than companies which have to fight for their
existence ; and the conditions under which municipal
authorities work tend to make this characteristic
still more pronounced in their case. If a town
council has borrowed large sums for horse tramways,
and has not paid them off', it will not be anxious to
raise heavy additional loans for electric tramways ;
if it has large gasworks, it will not be readily in-
clined to establish a competitive supply of electric
light. This is alleged to be one of the causes why
until quite recently Great Britain has lagged behind
other countries in the application of electricity to
transit and lighting. That there is some truth in
the charge must be admitted ; but in the last few
years there has been a very great improvement,
and the large municipalities are now showing much
enterprise and initiative. This is an answer also
to the further objection that town councils have
enough to do as it is; that their members cannot
be specialists, and have neither the leisure nor the
ability to direct great business enterprises which
can be commercially successful only when conducted
by experts stimulated by strong personal interest.
All experience shows that normally the more work
a local authority is given, the more likely it is to
attract the services of able and experienced citizens ;
energetic and capable men are not inclined to spend
their time upon councils which have to do little
MUNICIPAL POLICY AND TRADING 137
work of importance. In the large cities there is no
lack of ability; a small town has generally less to
draw upon, but then the amount which it under-
takes is less, and it would be quite reasonable to
impose more restrictions upon its enterprises than
would be necessary in the case of a more important
authority. Efficient management depends upon the
existence of a council of men of fair ability and
judgment, not necessarily possessed, any more than
the ordinary directors of a railway company, of
technical ability; and its readiness to get the best
expert advisers possible, and to make the fullest use
of their services. The fulfilment of these condi-
tions, and the stimulus to good work which comes
from constant supervision by the citizens, depend
upon the existence of a healthy and active civic
enthusiasm, and that is most likely to be felt in a
municipality where the council has large and varied
powers. The possible corruption arising from the
existence of a large class of municipal employees
is not greater (as the experience of the United States
has abundantly shown) than that likely to be caused
by the struggle of competing private companies for
a municipal monopoly; and for protection against
this, and for the assurance of moderation in muni-
cipal policy, we must look to the better education
nt all classes of the community in the privileges and
duties of citizenship.
So far, then, the advantages of municipal owner-
ship may be said, on the balance, to be at leasl
equal to those arising from controlled private
enterprise; hut there is a further group of objections
to munieipalisation which, under present conditions.
138 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
are serious. The recent developments in the pro-
duction of electric light and power have made it
possible to supply large areas easily, and once that
is the case, it is obviously much cheaper for the
supply to be on a large scale and for wide areas.
So Ions: as small areas are allowed to have their
own electric light works, their own electric tram-
ways, when there is any other alternative, so long
will there be waste of money, of men, of energy.
A private company oan extend its operations over
any area in which it can get the right of supply ; it
need take no account of administrative boundaries.
But local authorities are in a different position;
there is much jealousy or, if a less invidious term be
desired, rivalry between them; each wishes to do
things for itself. But that, as already remarked,
involves an enormous amount of waste, and the
citizens do not get the services nearly so cheaply
as they might do if the whole supply were provided
from a common centre. When, for instance, a large
city (as is common in the Midlands) is surrounded
by a group of urban areas, it is clearly absurd for
each to have its own electric lighting plant; all
could be supplied more cheaply and better from
the city. With other services and other groups of
areas the facts are the same. To remedy this, two
alternative policies are possible. The first is the
establishment of joint boards, but this is not free
from difficulty : if the smaller authorities have a
minority of representatives, they are likely to be
dissatisfied ; and if they are on an equality or in a
majority, the large authority will be dissatisfied.
The other possibility is to give the council of the
MUNICIPAL POLICY AND TRADING 139
central area power to supply the surrounding dis-
tricts, as has been done by Parliament in some
cases, and in that case to pay to the local authori-
ties of these districts some share of the proceeds
(unless it does that, it is in the position of an
ordinary trader towards the outlying area). But
the smaller authorities do not ordinarily welcome
such an arrangement, since it entitles an outside
authority to interfere with their streets and to control
important services within their boundaries. Both of
these policies present difficulties which can be over-
come only by the exercise of much tact on both
sides ; but until our administrative areas are re-
organised, one or other of them must be adopted
if the municipal supply of public services is not to
be much more wasteful than private action.
CHAPTER XI
LOCAL FINANCE
The expenditure for local purposes in England and
Wales is met by receipts from four main sources —
local taxation, subventions from the central govern-
ment, municipal services and enterprises of various
kinds, and loans. The proceeds of the first three
of these go towards ordinary expenditure, and of
them local taxation is much the most important ;
in 1902-3 of the total revenue of local authorities
(not from loans) more than one- half (actually about
53 per cent.) was derived from local taxes, or, as
they are technically called, rates. The following
table gives the figures for that year : —
Items of Receipt.
Amount.
£50,382,412
12,782,803
4,454,111
988,266
17,691,001
1,198,908
1,850,845
2,412,144
473,035
2,414,554
Exchequer contributions of all kinds . .
Tolls and dues (including harbours and
Municipal enterprises (gas, water, electricity,
tramways)
Cemeteries, baths, museums, asylums, &c.
Total ordinary receipts
Loans
£93,935,417
35,271,367
£129,206,784
Total receipts . . .
140
LOCAL FINANCE
141
Most of the principal items of expenditure by
the various groups of authorities have been already
noticed in previous chapters ; the total amount
spent not out of loans in 1902-3 was £92,882,545,
and out of loans £36,086,198— or £128,968,743 in
alL The next table shows the way in which this
expenditure has increased : —
Year.
Expenditure.
Not Out of Loans. ' Out of Loans.
1884-5
1889-90
1894-5
1899-1900
1902-3
£44,053,904
48,179,573
59,715,074
75,990,248
92,882,545
£9,853,795
7,088,554
13,381,388
24,872,032
36,086,198
The most striking thing in this table is the tre-
mendously rapid increase in both columns since the
year 1894-5. In this period there is no one object
of increased expenditure which can be specially
singled out ; the increases have been in practically
every department of administration. The following
table gives the outstanding debt of all local authori-
ties for the same years : —
Year.
Outstanding Debt.
1-5
l--:t-90
L894 •".
1899 L900
1902-3
£1 73,207.1)68
198,671,312
235,335,049
293,864,224
:57<V;n7,l!l3
142
ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
It will be convenient to add at this point a table
(taken from two in the last Local Taxation Returns)
showing the increase of the average amounts of
local taxation per head and per pound of rateable
value, and of local debt per head : —
CO
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r-t
£ S. D.
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LOCAL FINANCE 143
The increases shown in these tables are certainly
serious, the more so as they show no sign of slacken-
ing. But it must be borne in mind that the re-
sponsibility for the growth of expenditure does not
rest entirely, or even chiefly, with the local authorities
themselves. Much of it is due to the heightened
standards of educational and poor law administra-
tion imposed upon them by Parliament or central
departments; much more is due to the growing
regard for national health, and the demand from
all classes for fresh services to be rendered to them
by the state ; and, so far as the debt is concerned,
a very large part of it, as will be seen later, has
been incurred for enterprises of an industrial nature
which have been so demanded from the authorities
by the citizens, and are, or ultimately will be,
financially remunerative. But the chief fact is that
local authorities have in the main not so much
created as followed the public demand for services
from them ; the citizens may have been ill advised
in thuir demands, but that is another matter. Only
a strong and persistent expression of public opinion
can be an effective check on further increases in
expenditure, though some improvements may be
made in the machinery of control.
I. — Local Rates
The difference between a tax and a rate is now
little more than historical. The tax was a com-
pulsory payment made by particular individuals
on particular occasions, the taxing authority having
144 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
only a general, and sometimes very vague, idea as
to the probable amount of the proceeds; whilst in
the case of the rate the amount to be obtained was
first determined, and the payment of it then divided
between the various persons liable in accordance
with some definite scale. This is the distinction
between the impots de quotiU and impots de re-
partition in France ; but the development of finan-
cial skill, enabling the proceeds of a tax to be
determined beforehand with very great exactitude,
has rendered this particular distinction of small
importance. Still the difference in term in this
country is useful as marking a difference in kind;
the rate differs from the tax in that it is the custo-
mary form of local taxation, and that it is "paid
only in respect of certain kinds of property, and
levied from the occupiers and not the owners of
that property."
The basis of all English local taxation is the poor
rate, which was established in 1601, but has been
considerably modified in the three centuries of its
history. Its present form dates from the Parochial
Assessments Act of 1836, which confirmed the prin-
ciple that the poor rate must be made " upon an
estimate of the net annual value of the several
hereditaments rated thereunto, i.e. of the rent at
which the same might reasonably be expected to
let from year to year " free of all usual tenants'
charges, and making allowance for repairs. " Rate-
able hereditaments " include land and buildings,
railways, canals, water-works, gas-works, mines,
quarries, sporting rights, tithos and tithe rent
LOCAL FINANCE 145
charges. So that the poor rate has corne to be a
rate on the annual value of the real property in each
parish, levied not on the owner, but on the occupier ;
and the rent is regarded as the measure of the
annual value of the property, subject for assessment
purposes to deductions according to a sliding scale
for tenants' charges, &c. Local taxation is in theory
proportional to the benefit received, whilst national
taxation is in the main according to ability; and the
rent which a man is willing to pay is taken as an
index of the benefit he derives from residence in a
particular locality. The economic causes which have
brought about the influx of population into the
towns, and the expenditure of local authorities on
sanitation, lighting and police, have enhanced the
value of both land and houses to the owners by
substantially increasing rents, but the occupiers still
normally bear the whole burden of the local rates.
In the case of houses of small rental, especially in
districts where the population is of the poorer
class and householders change frequently, the owner
commonly compounds with the local rating authority
for the rates due on his houses (a reduction being
allowed to him), or pays them without compounding,
and includes as much of them as possible in the
rents which he obtains from his tenants.
A large part of the money raised by what is
called the poor rate is spent on services uncon-
nected with the relief of the poor; it is collected
on the same basis and by the same machinery
simply :is a matter <>f convenience. The following
table gives the chief authorities, the rates levied
K
146
ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
by them, and the principal purposes for which they
are used.
Authority.
Guardians and
Overseers.
CountyCouncil.
Town Councils.
Do.
Do.
Urban District
Council.
Do.
Rural District
Council.
Do.
Parisli Council
or Meeting.
Eate.
Poor Rate.
County Rate (part of
Poor Rate).
Borough Rate, and in
some cases Watch
Rate (both some-
times part of Poor
Rate).
General District Rate.
Special Rates under
Local Acts.
General District Rate.
Special Rates under
Local Acts.
Poor Rate.
Special Expenses
Rate.
Poor Rate.
Purpose.
Relief of Poor and
minor services.
Police, Main Roads,
Asylums, Educa-
tion.
Municipal Services,
Police and Asylums
in some cases; Edu-
cation.
Roads, Sanitation, &c.
Improvements, &c.
Roads, Sanitation, &c.
Improvements, &c.
Highways and Gene-
ral Expenses.
Sewerage and Water
Supply.
General Purposes.
Of these rates, the county rate is the result of an
apportionment between the parishes of the expenses
of county administration, and for the purposes
of this apportionment a county council may make
LOCAL FINANCE 147
its own assessment of the parishes, which may differ
from that made by the overseers ; but the amount
required from each parish is raised in it by the poor
rate valuation. The county rate may be " general "
or " special " ; in the latter case it is limited to
a part of the county, and is for special services
rendered in that part. The borough rate is levied by
the town councils on the poor rate basis. The general
district rate is somewhat different, since agricultural
land, railways, and canals, and tithes and tithe rent
charges are assessed at only one- quarter of their
valuation for the poor rate ; and the same reduction
is made in connection with the special expenses
rate in rural districts. There are also a number of
special rates, such as private improvement rates
levied by various authorities under the Public
Health Act, 1875, and miscellaneous rates under
Private Acts or for special purposes (such as public
libraries).
The assessment and valuation list of each parish
is made by the overseers, who present it to the
assessment committee of the board of guardians of
the union of which the parish forms part. That
committee hears objections made to the assessments
within four weeks, and may in consequence amend
the list, or it may make alterations on its own
initiative. Once the list is settled, it is the legal
basis for the poor rate, and the other rates made on
the same basis. Appeal lies from the decisions of
tin- committee to Quarter Sessions, and from thence
to tip- High Court of Justice. The general district
rat'' is Leviable by the urban district authorities
directly, if they think fit; but this is commonly, and
148 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
the other rates always, levied by means of precepts
addressed to the overseers of each parish requiring
them to raise the indicated sums. In London the
functions of the overseers have been transferred to
the metropolitan borough councils, who raise the
money by a " general rate." In order to attempt to
equalise somewhat the burden of local taxation in
the different parts of London an Act of Parliament,
in 1894, directed that a uniform rate of sixpence in
the pound on the rateable value should be levied all
over London, and the proceeds distributed between
the (present) boroughs according to population. An
extension of this system on a sounder basis is one of
the most desirable reforms in local taxation, since
much of the expenditure which now presses very
heavily upon particular localities is incurred for
purposes (such as public health) which are " national,"
and would be local only if the districts could be com-
pletely shut off one from another.
II. — Subventions from the Central Government
The most characteristic feature of English local
finance at the present day is the system of grants by
the central government, which are more developed
here than in any other country. Apart from the
very large grants towards the cost of national ele-
mentary education, the chief aid to the localities is
given by means of the Local Taxation Account and
the Agricultural Kates Grant. The latter may be
dismissed briefly ; the history of state subventions
to local authorities in the nineteenth century is the
history of the efforts of the landowners and farmers
LOCAL FINANCE 149
to shift on to the general taxpayer their part of the
local rates. The success of this effort culminated in
the Act of 1896, which directed the annual payment
by the central Exchequer towards the relief of the
rates upon agricultural land of a sum equal to one-
half the rates so levied in 1895-6. The sum so paid
to local authorities by the Exchequer was £1,328,019
in 1902-3. The Local Taxation Account is a much
more complicated matter ; it is a result of the re-
arrangement made in 1888 of a number of grants
which had grown up in the preceding half-century.
Until 1888 these were voted annually by Parliament,
and amounted to about £2,600,000 ; but in that year
the method of annual votes was discontinued, and
instead it was directed that the whole of the proceeds
of certain excise duties, more than equal in amount
to the discontinued grants, should be handed over
annually to the local authorities ; and in addition
they were given one-half of the yield of the probate
(now the estate) duty, whatever that might be. They
were also given in 1890 the proceeds of certain sur-
taxes on beer and spirits (commonly called the
"whisky money"). These last two items were
divided between the component parts of the United
Kingdom in the proportion of 80 per cent, to England
and Wales, 11 per cent, to Scotland, and 9 per cent,
to Ireland. All these sums are paid first into the
Local Taxation Account, which therefore receives: —
(a.) The proceeds of the "local taxation licences " —
Eor the sale of wine, spirits, beer, tobacco, and
game; for auctioneers, house-agents, pawn-
brokers; for dogs, guns, armorial bearings,
carriages, dec.
150 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
These produced over £3,600,000 in 1902-3.
(b.) 80 % of one-half of that portion of the estate duty
which is derived from personalty (amounting
in 1902-3 to about £2,200,000). But from
this there is deducted a sum of £120,000
under the Tithe Rent Charge (Rates) Act
1899, which did for the owners of tithe rent
charges what the Act of 1896 had done for the
occupiers of agricultural land. This amount
is deducted by the Commissioners of Inland
Revenue from the proceeds of the estate duty
due to local authorities before they are paid
into the Local Taxation Account.
(c.) 80 % of the beer (6d. a barrel) and spirits (3d.
a gallon) surtaxes ; this amounted to about
£1,200,000 in 1902-3. From this, however,
there is deducted by the Treasury the sum
of £300,000, which is paid directly to the
police pension funds (half to London, half
to the rest of the country), and also a vari-
able sum for certain expenditure under the
Diseases of Animal Acts from the estate duty.
In all there was paid over to councils of the
administrative counties and county boroughs, and
to the Metropolitan Police in 1902-3, the sum of
£6,631,782 (this includes a small sum of £12,737
paid directly by the Treasury to revising barristers
on behalf of certain councils, and a sum of
£782,688 paid similarly to the authorities of the
Metropolitan Police ; but both these sums are in-
cluded in the distribution arrangement now to be
described).
The council of each administrative county and
LOCAL FINANCE 151
county borough receives the proceeds of the licence
duties collected within its area ; the amounts of the
estate duty and " whisky money " available are
divided between the counties in proportion to the
amounts of the grants which they received in 1887-8
(the adjustment between the administrative counties
and the county boroughs was made by agreement or
by arbitration). But on the sums so received there
are a number of permanent charges. Out of their
shares of the licence and estate duties the councils
of counties and county boroughs must pay to the
boards of guardians within their areas the fees of
pauper children attending elementary schools, the
salaries of teachers in poor law schools, an amount
equal to salaries, superannuation, and allowances in
1887-8 of union officers outside London and the
salaries of poor law medical officers in London, part
of the remuneration of registrars, certain payments
to public vaccinators, and four shillings per head per
week for the maintenance of pauper lunatics. The
county councils must pay to town and district
councils half the salaries of medical officers of health
and sanitary inspectors approved by the Local
Government Board, the contribution towards the
maintenance of lunatics, and half the cost of police
pay and clothing in those boroughs which have a
separate force. Each county council and county
borough council -must transfer from its Exchequer
Contribution Account to other accounts half the
cost of police pay and clothing, contributions for
lunatics chargeable not to individual parishes but
to the counties or county boroughs, half the salaries
of medical officers of health and sanitary inspectors,
152 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
and some other small miscellaneous payments.
From the "whisky money" county councils con-
tribute a small proportion to non- county boroughs
for technical education. The surplus of both groups
of receipts are available for general purposes, but
practically the whole of the " whisky money " has
been used, as was recommended but not directed,
for technical education. The following table gives
the figures of the Exchequer Contribution Account
for the year 1902-3 :—
Receipts
(1.) Estate duty ^ £5 702 986
(2.) Local taxation licences . . . J
(3.) Surplus of "whisky money" after
deduction of contribution to police
pension funds .... 897,402
(4. ) Miscellaneous receipts (adjustments,
&c.) 18,657
(5.) For revising barristers from (1.),
(2.) and (3.) .... 12,737
Total £6,631,782
Payments
(1.) Contributions by county and county
borough councils to boards of
guardians £1,822,300
(2.) Contributions by county councils to
town and district councils . . 323,830
(3.) Miscellaneous payments (adjust-
ments, &c.) .... 14,676
Carry forward £2,160,806
LOCAL FINANCE 153
Brought forward £2,160,806
(4.) Half cost of Metropolitan Police
(London and other counties) . 782,688
(5.) Transfers by county and county
borough councils to other ac-
counts —
Technical education .
£771,388
Half police pay and
clothing
Medical officers and
1,104,622
inspectors
Other payments
7,696
18,105
Surplus —
To general account
1,814,799
3,716,610
12,737
(6.) Payment by Treasury
barristers .
to revising
Total
£6.672,841
The principle of the Exchequer Contribution
Account — the equalisation of burdens by relieving
local rates out of national taxation — is sound enough,
but the present arrangement is unsatisfactory. As
to the grants as a whole, there is the objection that
they do not come up for annual review by Parlia-
ment, and that, except in the case of the police
grant, and to some extent the payments to medical
officers and sanitary inspectors, there is no guarantee
for efficiency in the use of the grants. It' the Home
Secretary should withhold his <■■ rtificate tor a count y
or county borough police force, the council would
have to repay the Exchequer from its Exchequer
Contribution Account a sum equal bo half the cos!
154 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
of paying and clothing its police ; if the certificate
is withheld from a non-county borough force, then
the contributing county does not pay the amount
due to the borough, but can make use of it for its
own purposes. The distribution between the counties,
and again between these and the county boroughs,
is on a decidedly unsatisfactory basis, and further,
a county council has to contribute half the salaries
of all medical officers and sanitary inspectors ap-
pointed by sanitary authorities within its area, and
half the cost of police pay and clothing in non-
county boroughs, but has no control whatever over
expenditure for either of these matters. So a non-
county borough may suddenly spend lavishly on
its police force, and then demand half the amount
from the county council; the latter must pay, and
therefore the extravagance of the non-county borough
may mean that the county council has less to spend
for its own purposes. Finally, so far as counties and
county boroughs are concerned, they get no ad-
vantage by appointing their medical officers and
inspectors under the Local Government Board regu-
lations, since the payment of half the salaries of
these officers from the Exchequer Contribution
Account is a mere piece of bookkeeping.
There is a growing feeling that the system of
grants-in-aid should be extended, in order to
equalise somewhat the burdens which press so
heavily upon the poorer localities for services which
are of national importance. The Royal Commission
on Local Taxation reported in 1901 in favour of
an increase of the grants for a number of poor
law purposes and for police, and of a new grant
LOCAL FINANCE 155
for main roads ; and, though the amount contributed
from the central Exchequer towards education is
already very large, it is evident that it will be neces-
sary to give still more aid to the local authorities
for this purpose. But if the grants are to be ex-
tended, it is essential that the whole arrangement
should be completely revised, and it is desirable
that the annual vote, and therefore review, of the
amounts by Parliament should be restored, and that
there should be some sort of security for their
efficient use.
CHAPTER XII
LOCAL FINANCE— (continued)
III. — Proceeds of Municipal Property
and Services
The total receipts of local authorities in the year
1902-3 from public services of all kinds (including
water, gas, and electricity supply, tramways,
markets, harbours, bridges and ferries, baths and
washhouses, cemeteries, hospitals, asylums, fire
brigades, libraries, sewage farms, and slaughter-
houses) were about £22,500,000. Of course in many
of these cases the receipts go only a very little way
towards meeting the expenditure : this is especially
so, for example, with asylums and sewage disposal
works. The group of undertakings which can
fairly be regarded as " remunerative," i.e. likely to
yield an actual profit, is very small ; we can include
in it only waterworks (though for some of these a
profit is impossible), gasworks, electricity works,
tramways, markets, harbours, docks and piers, and
a few miscellanea. On these, the average annual
profit to the local authorities for the four years
ending March 1902 (according to the latest Local
Government Board report on reproductive under-
156
LOCAL FINANCE
157
takings) was £593,985, after payment of interest
on borrowed capital and contribution to sinking-
funds. The vexed questions connected with the
finance of " municipal trading " have been discussed
in a previous chapter : all that is necessary here is
to point out that these particular services as a
whole do pay their way and yield a small surplus,
whilst in a number of particular cases a substantial
sum is available from them for the relief of rates.
It should be added that the rents of corporate
property, which in the case of some municipalities is
considerable, yielded about £2,500,000.
IV. — Local Loans
It has already been stated that the total outstand-
ing debt of our local authorities in March 1903 was
about 371 million pounds. Of this rather more
than one-half has been incurred for services which
are classed as reproductive in the Local Government
Board return already mentioned (which includes
cemeteries and baths and washhouses). The chief
separate items are : —
W.-.1' i works
Harbours, &c.
( tasworks
Electric Lighting
Tramways
Markets
Housing
£63,130,859
30,743,881
23,110,919
18,550,120
17,413,797
7,663,708
7,176,510
158
ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
In the debt for non-reproductive undertakings,
the principal items were: —
Highways, &c.
Schools
Sewerage
Relief of the Poor
Asylums
Parks, &c. .
Public Buildings, &c.
Hospitals
£43,918,732
35,228,374
34,652,048
12,284,022
9,151,721
7,585,912
6,726,249
5,914,620
The amount borrowed in 1902-3 was about thirty-
six millions. Local authorities may be empowered
to borrow money either under clauses in general
Acts, or by Private Acts for special purposes. In
the former case (as, for instance, in the Municipal
Corporations Act, the Education Act, and the Public
Health Acts), it is customary for loans to be autho-
rised generally, and the maximum period for re-
payment specified ; but for each particular loan
and its terms, the approval of the government
department specially interested is necessary. This
confirmation is now also required, under the
standing orders of Parliament, for loans under
Private Acts, unless estimates showing the pro-
posed application of the money are set forth in
the Act itself. The Local Loans Act, 1875, was
intended to indicate certain modes of borrowing
which local authorities might employ. Usually
one of two methods is used. Local authorities may
have recourse to 'the Public Works Loan Commis-
sioners, who for certain purposes may advance
money from funds which they obtain either from
LOCAL FINANCE 159
the National Debt Commissioners or by the issue of
local loans stock . But many of the larger muni-
cipal boroughs early secured under special Acts
the right of raising money by the issue of stock
of their own, subject to various conditions ; the
power to do so was given to all county councils in
1888 ; and now, under the Public Health Act of
1890, any urban authority can raise loans in this
way (for public health purposes), if it can get the
approval of the Local Government Board by
Provisional Order. In London the metropolitan
boroughs can raise loans only by permission of the
County Council, subject to appeal to the Local
Government Board ; and the Council lends the
money. Parish councils in the same way borrow
from their county authority.
The Control of Local Finance
The limitations which have been imposed upon
both the form and extent of the financial operations
of local authorities, and the forms of the control
exercised by the central departments, are numerous
and varied. They may, however, be classified under
four heads.
(1.) Methods of the conduct of financial business.
— County councils and the councils of metropolitan
boroughs are required to appoint finance committees
with special duties. Thus the Act of 1888 directs
that " every county council shall from time to time
appoint a finance committee for regulating and con-
trolling the finance of the county ; and an order for
160 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
the payment of a sum out of the county fund, whether
on account of capital or income, shall not be made
by a county council except in pursuance of a re-
solution of the council passed on the recommenda-
tion of the finance committee, and any costs, debts,
or liability exceeding fifty pounds shall not be in-
curred except upon a resolution of the council
passed on an estimate submitted by the finance
committee." A similar arrangement is imposed on
London borough councils by the London Govern-
ment Act, 1899 ; and it has been voluntarily adopted
by a number of other authorities. With this we
may couple (since it is part of the work of the
finance committee) the requirement for county
councils of an elaborate budget to be prepared at
the beginning of each financial year — a method
voluntarily employed by many other councils.
Further, in most cases where it is proposed to
promote a private Bill in Parliament a special
meeting of the council, with particular notice, is
required for its authorisation. And in the munici-
pal boroughs the approval of the ratepayers is re-
quired — technically for the expenditure of money
on the promotion of the Bill, but actually for the
proposals which it contains, and therefore for the
expenditure which it involves. This is the only
case in this country of the referendum on the pro-
posals of the town councils, which is very commonly
used in America ; in England it is little more than
a form, but there are sometimes cases (as at Birming-
ham a few years ago) where the citizens have em-
phatically refused to allow their council to proceed
with a Bill. Finally there are requirements, either
LOCAL FINANCE 101
as to the form in which the accounts shall be kept
(as with the boards of guardians), or as to the forms
of summaries to be furnished to the Local Govern-
ment Board — a regulation which applies to all local
authorities.
(2.) The statutory limitation of rates and debt. —
The only instance of the legal restriction of rates for
general purposes is furnished by the parish councils,
which may not levy rates (exclusive of those under
the adoptive Acts) of more than 3d. in the pound
without the consent of a parish meeting ; and not
even then may they exceed 6d. in the pound. But
examples of this limitation for special purposes are
much more common. So under the Education Act
of 1902, local education authorities may not levy a
rate exceeding 2d. in the pound for the purposes of
higher education without the consent of the Local
Government Board. In a rural parish the highway
rate may not exceed 2s. 6d. in the pound without
the consent of four-fifths of the voters. In other
cases the restriction is more complete ; so the Public
Libraries Act, 1892, limits the rate leviable under it
to Id. in the pound — a limitation which has been
removed in a few cases, but only by clauses in private
Acts. The rates levied for the purposes of the
Museums and Gymnasiums Act, 1891, may not
exceed £d. in the pound for each purpose.
There are several instances also of the limitation
of debt, both for general and special purposes. Tims
a board of guardians may borrow money only up
to one-fourth of the rateable value of their union,
or up to ono-half by Provisional Order; county
councils for general administration cannot, borrow
i.
162 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
beyond one-tenth of the rateable value of their
areas except under Provisional Orders or Acts of
Parliament; and the amounts borrowed by sanitary
authorities under the Public Health Acts may not
exceed one year's assessable value of their districts,
except by approval of the Local Government Board
after local enquiry, and then they may not go be-
yond two years' value. These limitations are some-
times removed for special matters; thus the sums
borrowed by county councils under the Allotments
Acts, and by sanitary authorities for housing
schemes, are not to be included in the calculation
of the debt subject to these restrictions.
(3.) Legislative or departmental approval of
loans. — We have already seen that particular ap-
plications of borrowing powers under general Acts
commonly need the approval of a government de-
partment. The Parliamentary Committee on Local
Loans reported in 1902 that "each general statute
which confers borrowing powers upon local authori-
ties specifies a maximum period for the repayment
of loans raised under such powers. Within the
limits thus established a discretion is, in English
and Irish Acts, as a rule, left to the government
department specially concerned with the matter for
which the loan is required, to decide the exact
term for the redemption of each particular loan. . . .
It is obvious that the discretion left to the govern-
ment departments which fix the actual period for
the repayment of each loan is a very wide one. . . .
The Local Government Board, being charged with
the general supervision of local finance, takes into
its consideration in fixing the period for redemp-
LOCAL FINANCE 163
tion, not only the probable useful life of each
part of an undertaking for which a loan is desired,
but also the probable future condition of localities
with regard to debt, in order that the ratepayers of
the future may not be unduly burdened, and so un-
able to discharge efficiently the duties that are likely
to come upon them." This last sentence seems to
describe rather the professed ideal of the Board
than its actual accomplishment. The maximum
period allowed by Parliament is usually sixty years
(for housing it is now eighty years), but the Board
seldom allows the full period. The same approval
is sometimes required for loans under local Acts. In
all cases the department may hold a local enquiry,
hear evidence, and in authorising the loan desired it
may impose whatever conditions it thinks expedient.
But a very large amount — probably the greater
part — of local indebtedness is incurred not under this
departmental control at all, but under Local Acts
which gave power to the authorities promoting them
to borrow definite sums for definite purposes. For
the larger cities have usually found it more con-
venient to borrow in this way — since Private Acts
until comparatively lately could be got through
Parliament without undergoing a very close scrutiny
— than under an order of a government department
granted after enquiry; and, moreover, they can
usually get longer period for the repayment of
loans. There is no doubt that until recently Parlia-
ment was much too lax in its treatment of Private
Acts: the committee already quoted professed their
inability " to discover any general principlo by which
the periods allowed by 1<jcu1 Acts arc fixed," within
164 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
the maximum of sixty years imposed by the stand-
ing orders. An improvement has been brought
about, however, by the duty placed on the depart-
ments of reporting on Private Bills to the select
committees ; and, if they think necessary, of oppos-
ing them.
The London County Council is in a unique posi-
tion, since an order of both Houses directs that
" all Bills promoted by the London County Council,
containing power to raise money by the creation
of stock or on loan, shall be introduced as public
Bills," with the exception of Bills which contain
estimates, or accord with certain limitations pre-
scribed in the order as to the period in which the
loan may be raised and repaid.
(4.) The prevention and detection of illegal ex-
penditure. — In England we depend for this almost
entirely upon the audit by the officials of the
Local Government Board.
It is true that there is another remedy ; if an
order made for a particular payment by a town or
county council be deemed illegal, any interested
persons may apply to the High Court of Justice for
a writ of certiorari bringing up that order for review
by the Court ; and, if the order be found to be
invalid, it will then be quashed. The right is seldom
used, but there are instances ; and it is rather more
important in municipal boroughs than in counties,
since the accounts of the town councils are not
subject to the Local Government Board audit, ex-
cept so far as expenditure on education is concerned.
The accounts of all local authorities except muni-
cipal councils are examined yearly or half yearly
LOCAL FINANCE 165
by the district auditors of the Local Government
Board, and so are the education accounts of boroughs
which are authorities under the Act of 1902 ; the
other accounts of all boroughs may be so audited
by agreement, or, as in the case of Plymouth, under
the directions of a private Act — due to the fact that
only on this condition would Parliament allow Ply-
mouth to obtain additional powers. The auditors
have power to disallow illegal or improper expendi-
ture, either on the complaint of ratepayers or at
their own initiative, and to surcharge it upon the
individual members of the offending authority (i.e.
call upon them to refund the amount). An appeal
from an auditor's decision lies to the Local Govern-
ment Board, and also to the Courts (this latter,
however, is infrequent). The general policy of the
Board, if it upholds the auditor's opinion, is to re-
lieve the members of the local authority from the
consequences of their illegal action in the particular
instance, but to warn them that such relief will not
be given again. Thus in 1903-4, 3809 disallowances
and surcharges were made by the auditors, nearly
one-half being in the case of poor law authorities.
In 1042 cases there were appeals to the Local
Government Board against the auditor's surcharges,
with the following result : —
Confirmed and remitted .... 9(>7
Coniii med and not remitted . . . G3
Reversed . . . . . . . f)'2
I >e;ilt with itecording to merits . . 20
In this connection it should be noted that the Local
Government Board 1ms power under the Local
166 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Authorities' Expenses Act, 1887, to authorise ex-
penditure by local bodies which otherwise would be
disallowed by the auditors. In 1903-4, 2615 appli-
cations for such authorisation were granted, and 505
refused.
The audit is an extremely powerful means of
control, but it has two defects. The recent
school board cases have shown that the auditors
may continue for years to pass items which are
illegal, unless their attention is specially drawn to
them. And the audit (if, as is commonly the case,
the surcharges are remitted) does not prevent illegal
expenditure ; it only stops its recurrence.
The accounts of municipal corporations are ex-
empted from the Board audit, and are examined by
three auditors, of whom one is appointed by the
mayor from the members of the town council, and
the other two are elected burgesses. Their powers
are small ; they cannot disallow or surcharge ; they
can only draw attention to doubtful items. The
municipalities have always been opposed to the
extension of the Board audit to their own financial
operations, and they objected strongly but without
success to this in the case of their education ac-
counts. This is partly because they desire to main-
tain their independence of departmental control as
completely as possible, and partly because in their
view the auditors are apt to adopt too narrow an
interpretation of the law, and thereby to hinder
desirable experiments and developments.
The present situation of local finance, the persistent,
and in many instances unavoidable, increase of the
rates and the growth of local indebtedness calls for
LOCAL FINANCE 167
the most careful consideration. But it is not easy
to see what substantial reforms can be made. The
nationalisation of some of what are now local
burdens will do something to relieve the poorer
districts, which are also those where now the local
burdens are greatest; the taxation of site values
may be of some small use, but will need very great
care if inequity and ineffectiveness are to be avoided ;
and an extension, or a more systematic use, of the
central control may furnish a more effective check
than exists at present. But the ultimate control,
and therefore the responsibility, rests in each locality
with the ratepayers themselves ; and until they
rouse themselves to impress on their representatives
the need for economy, and of acquiescence in a
slower rate of municipal development, they cannot
expect any large improvement in the condition of
local finance.
CHAPTER XIII
LOCAL AUTHORITIES AND (I.) THE LEGISLATURE,
(II.) THE COURTS OF JUSTICE
I. — The Legislature
Powers may be conferred by the legislature on
local authorities in either one of two ways. The
legislature may authorise the local administrative
bodies to do all things not expressly forbidden,
though in certain cases the approval of a central
authority may be required. This is the plan adopted
in Germany, where the town authorities are vaguely
empowered to do anything which may be thought
to promote civic well-being; but for any specific
application of this general power administrative
approval is requisite. Or, alternatively, the legis-
lature may enumerate the powers which it intends
to be exercised by the local authorities which it
creates, and other specified powers may be bestowed
on them by the legislature in dealing with particular
matters such as public health or housing ; this is
the method with which we are familiar in England.
But it is obvious that a particular local authority
may desire to do things which it is not authorised
to do either by its constituent Act or by subsequent
general legislation. In such a case it must have
168
THE LEGISLATURE 169
recourse to Parliament ; and the result on the one
hand of the principle adopted in England, that
local authorities have only such legal powers and
duties as have been handed over to them by the
express provisions of statutory enactments, and on
the other hand of the activity and enterprise of
the various authorities, and especially of the munici-
palities, has been the growth of a great system of
Private Bill legislation. This is peculiar to Great
Britain, and it is of the utmost importance because
it means that in the main the development of the
work of our local authorities is controlled by Parlia-
ment, and not by bureaucratic central departments.
English local authorities, then, exercise powers
enumerated in (i.) General Acts, (ii.) Adoptive Acts,
which are a special class of General Acts, and
(iii.) Private Acts. The distinction between public
and private legislation is thus denned by Sir
Courtenay Ilbert : — " A Public Bill is introduced as a
measure of public policy, in which the whole com-
munity is interested, and originates on the motion
of some member of the House in which the Bill
is introduced. A Private Bill is a measure for the
interest of some person, or class of persons, whether
an individual, a corporation, or the inhabitants of
a county, town, parish, or other locality, and origi-
nates on the petition of the person or persons
interested. The object of a Private Bill is, in fact,
to obtain a privUegiv/m, that is to say, an exemption
from the general law, or provision for something
which cannot be obtained by means of a general
law whether that general law is contained in a
statute or is common law." A modification and
170 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
simplification of Private Bill legislation is the system
of (iv.) Provisional Orders.
(i.) General Acts. — Constituent Acts commonly
contain an enumeration of the powers intended to
be exercised by the local authorities which they
establish. This is the case, for instance, with the
Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834, and the Local
Government Acts of 1888 and 1894. The Municipal
Corporations Act of 1835 was to some extent an
exception, since it made no such attempt to draw
up a complete list of powers for the municipalities,
but contemplated their free use of Private Bill
legislation ; whilst the powers of the poor law
authorities were completely defined in 1834, and
the Act of 1888 withheld from the new county
councils the power to promote legislation.
Apart from the various powers conferred by these
constituent Acts, there are others conferred on all
authorities of any particular class or classes by
General Acts dealing with one special subject or
group of subjects of administration. Such, for ex-
ample, are the powers given to local authorities by
many of the Public Health Acts, the Lunacy Act, 1890,
the Diseases of Animals Act, 1894, and the Educa-
tion Act, 1902. A slight modification of this method
is the power given to a central department to direct
local authorities to do certain things specified in a
General Act, if it should think necessary.
In the case of a number of powers and duties
under General Acts, both constituent and other,
the legislature has not only defined them, but has
laid down in the Act itself the manner in which
they are to be exercised or discharged by the local
THE LEGISLATURE 171
authorities. Thus the Public Health Act, 1875,
gave directions as to the officers to be appointed,
the frequency of meetings, and the conduct of
business ; for special services a device frequently
employed is the requirement that a special com-
mittee be appointed whose relation to the council
is regulated in the Act. The most recent example
of this is the statutory committee of the local
education authority under the Act of 1902. In
other cases, where such minute regulations are not
laid down by Parliament, it often empowers a
government department to make such regulations ;
the most striking instance of this is furnished by
the Local Government Board in matters of poor
law administration.
(ii.) Adoptive Acts. — These are enactments con-
ferring on all or specified classes of local authorities
particular powers which they become entitled to
exercise either by merely passing, usually in a
special manner, a resolution formally " adopting "
the Act, or by this process followed by departmental
approval. The Adoptive Acts are very numerous ;
instances are the Tramways Act, 1870, the Light
Railways Act, 189G, the Baths and Washhouscs
Acts, 1846-1882, the Burial Acts, 1852-1885, and the
Public Libraries Act, 1892. In some cases parts of
Acts are adoptive, such as Part III. of the Housing
of the Working Classes Acts, 1890. And sometimes
permissive and compulsory clauses are intermingled ;
a conspicuous example is the Public Health Act,
1875, where clauses with "any authority shall"
and "any authority may" alternate in a very re-
markable fashion.
172 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
(iii.) Private Acts. — These we must examine in
greater detail, since they have been the chief means
of widening the sphere of the activity of local
authorities, and of giving free play to their initiative,
and also because Private Bill procedure is an in-
teresting and somewhat curious part of our legis-
lative machinery.
Up to 1903, of all local bodies, only municipal and
urban district councils and the London County
Council could promote Private Bills ; but in that
year the right was extended to county councils.
But there are certain differences. The Borough
Funds Act, 1872, authorised municipal corporations
and " other governing authorities " (which meant
sanitary authorities, and within these probably only
urban district councils) to promote or oppose any
local Bill, and to spend money out of the rates for
that purpose, on condition that a resolution to
that effect be passed by the council with special
formalities, that the resolution be approved by
a meeting of ratepayers and property owners, and
that the consent of the Local Government Board to
the introduction of the Bill be obtained. The Act
was amended in 1903, by the abolition of the
necessity of a meeting to approve expenditure in-
curred in opposing Bills, and of the system of
voting whereby one person might have as many
as six votes. In most cases this meeting of rate-
payers is a mere form, but it may be important
if there is real opposition in the district to the
Bill which the council is promoting. One would
suppose that a great town council would be suffi-
ciently acquainted with the feeling amongst the
THE LEGISLATURE 173
citizens not to promote a Bill to which any large
body of them were opposed or indifferent ; but that
this is not always the case is shown by the recent
curious instance of Birmingham, where at the poll
on a general powers Bill, supported by the great
majority of the council, and vigorously discussed
in the town for some time, only some 8 per cent,
of those qualified took the trouble to vote, and the
Bill was summarily disapproved by them. Under
the amending Act of 1903 provision is made for
the disapproval of particular clauses in a Bill deal-
ing with a number of separate matters, without
the whole Bill thereby being abandoned. Under the
previous law the rejection of a part of such a Bill
could be obtained only by the rejection of the
whole. The Local Government Board withholds its
consent usually only if the objects aimed at by a
Bill might be obtained in other ways, by Provi-
sional Order or under existing general statutes.
All Bills must be deposited by a certain date
before the commencement of the Parliamentary
session, and copies sent to all the departments
interested in the subject-matter. The Bills are then
read by official examiners, to see that they comply
with the standing orders fixed by each House.
These are concerned partly with procedure, partly
with clauses which must be included in each Bill
of a particular class. They are then read by the
Lord Chairman of Committees in tho House of
Lords, and tho Chairman of Committees in the
Commons; any objection on tho part of the par-
liamentary or departmental officials to particular
clauses or to principles involved arc noted, and
174 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
discussed with the promoters, who are usually com-
pelled to give way. The Lord Chairman, who
specially gives his attention to this matter (since
his colleague in the other House has more work
to do in connection with meetings of the House),
can practically disallow clauses by informing the
promoters that unless the obnoxious clause is with-
drawn he will decline to move the next stage of
the Bill in the Lords, and the Lords generally follow
his guidance in dealing with the readings of Private
Bills.
The Bills are then divided between the two Houses,
for convenience. They then follow the ordinary
legislative course, except at the committee stage.
Unopposed Bills, after first and second readings, go
in the Lords to a committee consisting of the Lord
Chairman alone ; in the Commons they go to a
committee composed of the Chairman and two other
members. For opposed Bills the readings in both
Houses are generally formal, though opposition some-
times takes place in the Commons ; the real conflict
is before the select committees, which consist in the
Lower House of four members, and of five in the
Upper House. Before a committee counsel and
witnesses may be heard on both sides; and a com-
mittee may reject the whole of a Bill, usually by
finding the preamble "not proven," or require any
amendments. No matter which House deals first
with a Bill, the committee in the other has a free
hand; but double fights are not very common.
There are, however, some differences of importance
between the committees of the two Houses. Each
Lords' committee decides for itself as to what
THE LEGISLATURE 175
opponents it will hear ; in the Commons there is a
special Court of Referees for the purpose. The
government departments are required to report on
all Bills touching matters with which they are con-
cerned in any way ; the Lords' committees are not
bound to take any notice of these reports, whilst
committees of the Commons are directed by the
Standing Orders to inform the House " whether any
report from any government department relative to
the Bill has been referred to the committee ; and
in what manner the recommendations in the report
have been dealt with." It should be noted also that
though the House as a whole interferes little with a
Private Bill as a rule, it may pass an " instruction "
to a committee on any Bill.
As to the subject-matter of a Private Bill, in addi-
tion to the limitations already mentioned as imposed
by the Local Government Board, it is a rule that no
Bill imposing duties on a government department
can be introduced as a Private Bill ; and the Lord
Chairman and his colleague may refuse to allow any
Bill to go forward which in their judgment is so
important that it ought to be treated as a Public
Bill. Finally, in order to secure something like
uniformity, all Bills containing clauses dealing with
sanitation or police go to a special standing com-
mittee.
The system of Private Bill legislation has been of
very groat value ; but it is costly, slow, and some-
what clumsy. The main objections to it are the
great expense and trouble involved when a local
authority has to secure highly paid counsel and
sometimes oxport witnesses, and to bring its local
170 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
witnesses up to Westminster and occasionally keep
them there for a considerable time ; and the amount
of the time of members of Parliament which it takes
up. The House of Commons, particularly, could
usefully devote to imperial and national matters
much of the time now devoted to local affairs ; and
the special arrangements made for Scotland by the
Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1899,
which will be described in the next section, indicates
one way in which the reform might be made.
(iv.) Provisional Orders. — These may be described
as orders issued by government departments en-
abling local authorities to do in particular instances
acts which Parliament has approved in principle;
but they do not come into force until they have
been incorporated in a Provisional Orders Confirma-
tion Bill, and that has been duly passed by Par-
liament. The system was commenced in 1845,
and has been greatly extended in recent years.
Orders are granted by the Board of Trade for the
establishment of docks and quays, gas and water
works, tramways, and electric light and power
works; by the Local Government Board for a
number of purposes, including changes of boun-
daries ; and by various other departments — most
of these can also issue Provisional Orders dealing
with various matters on their own initiative (within
limits laid down by Parliament). The orders are
granted after such enquiry as the department deems
necessary, and there is no appeal against its refusal
of an order. On the other hand, the grant of an
order may be challenged further, by opposition
to the Confirmation Bill in which it is included :
THE LEGISLATURE 177
in that case the Bill goes to a Select Committee,
which however almost invariably approves the de-
cision of the Local Government Board. The net
result of the system of Provisional Orders is to
substitute a departmental for a parliamentary en-
quiry, and to get rid of the expense of Private
Bill procedure.
Under the Act of 1899 all private legislation for
Scotland proceeds by Provisional Order, unless in
the opinion of the parliamentary authorities a pro-
posal does not relate wholly to Scotland, or raises
special questions of policy or principle, or is of
unusual magnitude — in these cases the ordinary
procedure by Private Bill must be adopted. A draft
order is presented by the applicants ; if all the
required conditions are fulfilled, and there is no
opposition, then the Secretary for Scotland grants
the order. If there is opposition, it goes to a com-
mittee drawn from a body of commissioners, con-
sisting of members of the two Houses and twenty
other persons " qualified by experience of affairs "
appointed by the two parliamentary Chairmen in
conjunction with the Secretary for Scotland. Non-
parliamentary commissioners are to be appointed
to hold an enquiry only if the committee cannot
be made up from the members of Parliament ; but
inasmuch as each enquiry is to be held in Scotland
at a place selected " with due regard to the subject-
matter of the proposed order and the locality to
which it relates," it is evident that the non-parlia-
mentary members are likely to be largely employed,
On the report of the committee, the Secretary for
Scotland decides; and if he issues the Provisional
M
178 ENGLTSH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Order it follows the ordinary course. The great
merits of the plan are its quickness, cheapness (since
the enquiry is not held in London), and the re-
duction of the amount of work thrown on Parlia-
ment, and it appears to give general satisfaction ;
whilst it has the great advantage over the English
Provisional Order system that it does not leave the
enquiry and decision solely to departmental officials.
II. — The Courts of Justice
Reference has been made several times in the
preceding chapters to the fact that, except in rare
cases, the central departments have no means of
compelling, by administrative methods, obedience
to the law on the part of the local authorities; all
they can do is to request the aid of the courts of
justice. Moreover, when a central department
issues an order to a local authority, or gives a de-
cision which involves an interpretation of the law,
the local administrators are by no means bound
to accept that order or interpretation as binding ;
they also can appeal to the courts. These are
then the sole authorities which can compel the
local authorities to obey the law ; and at the same
time they are a protection to the local^ councils
against arbitrary acts on the part of the central
administration. Further, in the event of a dispute
arising 1 between the citizen and the local autho-
rities, recourse must be had to the same courts
and the same processes as if it were a dispute
between two private citizens. It remains for us
THE COURTS OF JUSTICE 170
then to notice the chief processes employed in these
various cases.
But first there is one matter of very great import-
ance. The courts whose aid is invoked in all these
instances are the ordinarv courts of the land, consti-
tuted in the ordinary way and working by the ordinary
legal processes. In most continental countries, on the
other hand, questions arising between central and
local authorities, or between one local authority and
another, or between a local authority and a citizen,
are decided by special tribunals constituted in a
particular way and dealing with what is known as
" administrative law." The difference in the constitu-
tion of local authorities abroad and our own is so
great that it is impossible to give in this place any
intelligible explanation of the effect of this arrange-
ment on the relations between the central and local
authorities; but its effect on the relation of the
citizen to the authority can be indicated briefly.
In general terms, for example, the rule of administra-
tive law in France is that in the event of a dispute
between a citizen and an official arising out of an act
done by the latter wrongly in the discharge of what
he believed to be his duty, or in obedience to orders,
the dispute is determined by a special court Avhich
consists partly of lawyers and partly of officials; and
though. the court may declare the act or order
invalid, the citizen cannot recover from the official
any compensation for any damage which lie may
have suffered; and the official responsible is liable
to no penalty except that which bis administrative
superiors may choose to inflict upon him. Jn Eng-
land, od the contrary, all officials responsible for such
180 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
an illegal act are responsible, and are liable in the
ordinary courts for any damage done to the citizen,
just as if they were merely private persons. " There is
no exception in England to the rule that every public
proceeding, be it the issue of a warrant to arrest, or a
demand for rates, or a summons to pay money due to
a public authority, or an order of justices, is just as
much a matter of ordinary law, and is liable to be
questioned in the same way, as a private suit or
action brought by one individual against another. In
either case the question as to what is lawful has to be
decided by the ordinary courts — subject, where the
issue involved is serious, to an appeal to some higher
tribunal" (Redlich and Hirst, ii. p. 365). There-
fore any citizen, believing himself to be wronged by
an action of the local authority, can make use of the
same remedies (prosecution of officials, action for
damages, &c.) against the doer of the act as he would
employ against another private citizen ; the Public
Authorities Protection Act, 1893, provides only that
an action or prosecution against any person for an
action done in the supposed discharge of a public
duty cannot be commenced after six months have
elapsed. On the other hand, a local authority can
take proceedings against an individual citizen (e.g.
for the contravention of a bye-law, or the non-pay-
ment of rates) only before the ordinary tribunals,
which in deciding the case really decide as to the
validity of the action of the local authority. Dis-
putes between two local authorities, if they will not
accept the arbitration of the Local Government
Board, are settled by the same legal processes as
civil suits between individuals.
THE COURTS OF JUSTICE 181
There are, however, three special writs issued by
the King's Bench which must be noticed — the
Mandamus, the Writ of Certiorari, and the Writ of
Prohibition. The first of these is of very great im-
portance, since it is practically the only means which
exists for compelling a local authority to do its work.
It is " a command, issuing in the King's name, from
the Court of King's Bench, and directed to any
person, corporation, or inferior court of judicature
within the King's dominions, requiring them to do
some particular thing therein specified, which ap-
pertains to their office and duty." Application for
a mandamus may be made only by some per-
son or persons having a special right to call for
the performance of the particular act in question ;
and in practice application is usually made by a
government department, moved thereto by some
individual, or acting on its own initiative. The use of
the mandamus is limited by the conditions (1) that
it is issued only to compel the performance of a
duty obligatory on the authority to whom it is
directed ; (2) that there is no other adequate and
equally convenient and effective legal remedy avail-
able. Opportunity is given by the courts to the
authority against whom it is sought to be used to
show cause why it should not be issued ; and this
enables any legal question involved to be duly
argued and determined. If the mandamus is issued,
and the local authority continues recalcitrant, its
members become guilty of contempt of court, and
;irc liable to be committed to prison. The Local
Government Board docs nol often find it ncccssarv to
apply for the mandamus, but instances occur from
182 ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
time to time, as in the case of the Leicester Guardians
in 1899.
The writ of Certiorari is a means of bringing up
before the Court of King's Bench the decision of an
inferior court for review, in order that it may be
either affirmed or quashed. It enables, therefore,
any person aggrieved by the decision of one of the
lower tribunals (e.g. a bench of justices of the peace)
in a matter connected with local government to
appeal to the King's Bench; though it is compar-
atively little used now, owing to the adoption of the
plan of appeal by means of a case upon a question
of law stated by the lower tribunal for the considera-
tion of the High Court. But it is still the method
of bringing before the courts any legal question
involved in the decision of a Local Government Board
auditor. The Poor Law Amendment Act, 1844,
directs that " any person aggrieved by any allowance,
disallowance, or surcharge by an auditor of any
union, district, or parish can make the auditor state his
reasons in the book of account in which the allow-
ance or disallowance was made, and . . . may apply
to the Court of King's Bench for a writ of certiorari
to remove into the King's Bench the said allowance,
disallowance, or surcharge in the same manner as if
it were an order of the justices of the peace." The
most conspicuous recent instance of this writ was the
case in which the provision of evening continuation
schools and higher grade teaching by the School
Boards was held to be illegal.
There are a few cases in which decisions of local
authorities may be brought up in the same way.
Thus section 141 of the Municipal Corporations Act,
THE COURTS OF JUSTICE 183
1882, and section 80 of the Local Government Act,
1888, provide that any order for payment made by a
municipal or county council may, on the application
of any person duly entitled, be removed into the
High Court by writ of certiorari, and may there be
wholly or partly disallowed or confirmed.
Finally, the writ of Prohibition, as its name im-
plies, is an order issued by the High Court to inferior
authorities directing them to refrain from doing
particular acts which are beyond their competence.
It may be ; used against both central and local
authorities.
It will not be inappropriate to conclude this
chapter, and with it this brief survey of English
local government, by reminding the reader of that
fundamental feature of the British constitution which
Professor Dicey calls " the rule of law." That
means, to quote his own words, " in the first place,
the absolute supremacy or predominance of regular
law as opposed to the influence of arbitrary power,
and excludes the existence of arbitrariness, of
prerogative, or even of wide discretionary authority
on the part of the government. . . It means, again,
equality before the law, or the equal subjection of all
classes to the ordinary law of the land administered
by the ordinary law courts . . . (it) excludes the
idea of any exemption of officials or others from the
duty of obedience to the law which governs other
citizens or from the jurisdiction of the ordinary
tribunals. . . Tho notion which lies at the bottom of
the ' administrative law ' known to foreign countries is
that affairs or disputes in which tho government or its
servants are concerned aro beyond the sphere of the
184 ENULISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
civil courts and must be dealt with by special and
more or less official bodies. This idea is unknown
to the law of England, and indeed is fundamentally
inconsistent with our traditions and customs." Of
the principles thus formulated this outline sketch
of English local government will have furnished
abundant illustration.
APPENDIX
A BRIEF BIBLIOGRAPHY
A. Legal Textbooks.
Wright, R. S., and Hobhouse, H. Local Govern-
ment and Local Taxation. 2nd ed., 1894.
Arnold. Law of Municipal Corporations. Ed.,
1894.
Macmorran and Dill. Local Government Act,
1888. 3rd ed., 1898.
Hadden. Handbook to the Local Government Act,
1894. 2nd ed., 1895.
Hunt. London Government Act, 1899. 1899.
Glen. Law of Public Health and Local Govern-
ment. 12th ed., 1899.
Mackenzie. Powers and Duties of Poor Law
Guardians. 4th ed., 1895.
Casson and Whitblby. The Education Act, 1902.
1903.
B. Other Works.
Odgkks, \V. B. Local Government, 1899.
Redlich, J., ami Eirst, B\ W. Local Government
in England. 2 vols. L903.
M a i/i i : 1 1 ;, M . K. English Local Government of
To-day: a study in the relations of central and
Local government. 1897.
Fowi.i:, T. VV. The Poor Law. 1898.
185
18G ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Chance, W. Our Treatment of the Poor. 1899.
Balfour, Graham. Educational Systems of Great
Britain and Ireland. 2nd ed., 1904.
Simon, J. English Sanitary Institutions. 1897.
Sykes, J. F. Public Health and Housing. 1901.
Darwin, L. Municipal Trade. 1903.
Shaw, Bernard. Common Sense of Municipal
Trading. 1904.
Blunden, G. H. Local Taxation and Finance.
1895.
Cannan, E. History of Local Rates in England.
1896.
Cannan, E. Financial Relations of English Local
Authorities (in Economic Journal, March, 1903).
Ilbert, C. P. Legislative Methods and Forms.
1902.
Wheeler. Practice of Private Bills. 1900.
Dicey, A. V. Law of the Constitution. 6th ed.,
1903.
Goodnow, F. J. Comparative Administrative Law.
2 vols. 1897.
The Municipal Year-Book. Annual volume.
The London Manual. Annual volume.
Yauthier, A. Le gouvernement locale en Angle-
terre. 1898.
Arminjon, P. L'administration locale en Angleterre.
1895.
Hugo, C. Stadteverfassung und Municipalsozial-
ismus in England. 1897.
Shaw, A. Municipal Government in Great Britain.
1895.
C. Parliamentary Papers.
Annual Report of the Local Government Board.
Annual Report of the Board of Education.
APPENDIX 187
Annual Local Taxation Returns (8 parts, including
summary).
Annual Returns of Tramway and Gas Undertak-
ings (issued by the Board of Trade).
Report on Municipal Corporations (Reproductive
Undertakings). 1902.
Reports of Select Committees of Lords and Com-
mons on Municipal Trading. 1900 and 1903.
Final Report of Royal Commission on Local Taxa-
tion. 1901.
Report of Select Committee of Commons on Repay-
ment of Local Loans. 1902.
Report of Departmental Committee on Highway
Administration. 1904.
Standing Orders of the Lords and Commons. Pub-
lished sessionally.
INDEX
Administrative law, 13, 179-80
"Adoptive Acts," 22, 171
Agriculture, Board of, 48, 50
Agricultural Eates Act, 148-9
Allotments, 18, 24, 27
Analysts, 107
Art Galleries, 109
Assessment, 147-8
Audit, 51, 164-6 ; in municipal
boroughs, 166
Baths and washhouses, 89, 98
Boroughs, county, 14, 30, 31 ;
municipal, 14, 30, 31 ; metro-
politan, 41
Borough fund, 34
Borough Funds Act, 160, 172
Bridges, 18, 114
Burial grounds, 28, 97
Cemeteries, 97
Certiorari, writ of, 164, 182-3
Cities, 31
City of London, 32-3, 40, 90
Committees, 19-20, 21-2, 24, 27, 34
Conservancies, 41
Control, central, 11-13, 49-56
Coroners, 123-4
Councils, constitution of, in
borough, 31-2; City of London,
40 ; county, 16-17, 39 ; metro-
politan borough, 41 ; parish, 27 ;
rural district, 24 ; urban district,
21
County, ancient, 15 ; administra-
tive, 16
County Councils, constitution, 16-
17; expenditure, 19; powers, 18,
57-8, 78, 87-8, 112-13, 119, 122,
123, 150-2, 159-60, 162, 172,
183
Courts of justice, 54-5, 178-84
Dairies, 89, 97, 108
Diseases of animals, 18, 33, 48, 50,
108
District, rural, definition, 14, 23-4 ;
council, 24 ; expenditure, 25 ;
powers, 24, 88-9, 97, 100, 104,
109, 112, 113, 151
District, urban, definition, 14,
21 ; council, 21 ; expenditure,
23; powers, 22, 78, 88-9, 96-8,
100, 112, 113, 114, 118-19, 124,
151
Education, Board of, 46-7, 54,
74, 75, 82-83 ; Committee of
Privy Council, 71, 72, 74 ; condi-
tion in 1902, 74-8; cost of, 75,
76, 83-4 ; Education Act, 1870,
72; Education Act, 1876, 73;
Education Act, 1902, 78-81;
evening continuation schools,
75-6 ; intermediate in Wales, 73,
76 ; " higher," 78, 80 ; history,
71-4; local authorities, 78, 79-
80 ; local committee, 78-9, 81 ;
managers, 79; "provided" and
" non - provided " schools, 79 ;
Royal Commission, 1861, 72 ;
school boards, 72, 75 ; Science
and Art Department, 72, 73,
76 ; teachers, 47, 71-2, 76-7, 78,
80 ; technical instruction, 73 ;
universities, 74, 81 ; voluntary
schools, 71, 77, 84
Elections, county, 17 ; borough,
32 ; London, 39
Electors, county, 17 ; urban and
rural districts, 21 ; municipal,
31-2 ; parish, 26
Equalisation of Rates (London), 148
Exchequer Contribution Account,
91, 149-54
188
INDEX
189
Factories and workshops, 99-100
Fertilisers and feeding stuffs, 90
Fire brigades, 124
Guardians, Board of, 37-8
Harbours and docks, 15, 48
Health, public, analysts, 88, 92;
authorities, 87, 88-90 ; bye-laws,
93, 98; cemeteries, 89, 97;
factories and workshops, 89,
99-100 ; history, 9-10, 85-7 ;
housing, 87, 101-6 ; infectious
diseases, 89, 97, 108; lighting,
89, 97 ; Local Government Board,
powers of, 51, 52, 54, 86, 92-5 ;
local authorities, powers of, 88-
90 ; London County Council,
powers of, 90; medical officers,
91 ; nuisances, 90 ; offensive
trades, 96 ; Public Health Acts,
1848, 85 ; 1875, 86, 87, 93, 94,
101, 106, 147; 1890, 87, 107;
recreation, 108-10 ; sale of food
and drugs, 88, 90, 106-8; sani-
tary inspectors, 91, 96 ; sewerage
and drainage, 89, 96 ; water
supply, 89, 98
Highways, authorities, 18, 22, 25,
L'7, 33, 39, 41, 112-14; classifica-
tion, 112, 113; cost, 19, 23, 25,
28, 36, 114 ; extent, 112-13 ;
reform, 114-16
Home Secretary, 43-4, 49-50,
123
Housing, 87, 89, 101-6
Industrial schools, 18
Infectious diseases, 89, 97, 108
Inspection, central, 51-2, 61, 83,
92, 93, 123 ; sanitary, 90, 96
Isolation hospitals, 88, 90
Justices, 10, 15-16, 122
Libraries, public 109-10
Licenses, local taxation, 149-50,
151
Lighting, 22, 23, 27, 28, 33, 30, 48,
89, '.»7
Light railways, 119 20
Local Authorities IKxpcnses) Act,
L66 6
Local government, definition, 7 ;
development, 8-12; non-bureau-
cratic in England, 12-13
Local Government Act, 1888, 10,
38, 55, 159, 170; 1894, 10, 21,
87, 170
Local Government Board, 44-6,
49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 59, 60-
62, 86, 89, 91, 92-5, 97, 98, 99,
102, 109, 159, 161, 162-3, 164-6,
172, 173
Local loans, amount, 19, 23, 25,
28, 36, 42, 133-4, 141, 142, 157-
8; authorisation, 158-9, 162-4;
limitation, 161-2
Local Loans Act, 158
Local taxation, amount, 140, 142 ;
character, 143-7 ; limitation,
161
Local Taxation Account, 149-50
Lodging-houses, 104-5
London County Council, 38-40, 90,
103, 114, 118, 124, 164
London Government Act, 38, 100
Lunatics, 57-8
Main roads, 19, 25, 112
Mandamus, writ of, 54-5, 181-2
Mayor, 31, 32, 41
Metropolis, 15, 38-42
Metropolitan Asylums Board, 40,
90
Metropolitan boroughs, 41, 90, 113,
160
Metropolitan Common Poor Fund,
08
Metropolitan police, 41, 123
Metropolitan Water Board, 40-1,
90
Milk supply, 89, 97, 107, 108
Mortuaries, 89, 93
Municipal trading, in England,
125-9 ; in Germany, 130 ; in
United States, 130 ; problems,
130-9
Nuisances, 96
< »pbk spaces, 109
Orders and regulations, 49-50
Overseers, 27, 147
Parish, urban, 11, 25 6; rural, 1 1,
20 ; organisation, 20 7 ; powers,
190
INDEX
27-8, 79, 88, 109; rates, 146,
161
Parliament, reform of, 9, 10
Police, 44, 121-3, 151, 152, 154
Poor relief, casual ward, 65 ; cost,
67-70 ; Elberfeld system, 67
indoor relief, 60, 63, 65-6
guardians, 37-8, 58-61 ; Local
Government Board, 49, 51, 60-
62 ; lunatics, 56-7 ; medical
relief, 65 ; officers, 61 ; outdoor
relief, 60, 63, 64-5 ; outdoor
relief prohibitory order, 63 ;
paupers, 63, 64, 68-9 ; Poor
Law Amendment Act, 1834, 9,
11, 61 ; poor rate, 144-5 ; re-
lieving officers, 66-7 ; schools,
66 ; poor law union, 36-7, 59 ;
workhouse, 65
Port sanitary authorities, 15, 40, 93
Private and public bills, distinction
between, 169
Private bill procedure, 172-6
Private Legislation Procedure
(Scotland) Act, 176, 177-8
Prohibition, writ of, 183
Provisional orders, 48, 50, 176-7
Rates, local, definition, 143-4;
borough, 146, 147 ; county, 146-
7 ; general district, 146, 147 ;
poor, 144-5, 146
Recorder, 31
Reformatories, 18
Registration, 38
Rivers, pollution of, 97
Slaughter-houses, 108
Standing joint committee, 18, 122
Statutory committees, 20, 34, 159-60
Stipendary magistrates, 31
Technical instruction, 73, 76
Tithe Rent Charge (Rates) Act, 150
Trade, Board of, 47-8, 50, 51, 118
Tramways, 117-21
Vaccination, 38, 97
Vestry, " open," 26 ; " select," 26
Watch committee, 34, 122
Water-supply, 23, 24, 33, 40, 89,
97, 98, 129 "
Weights and measures, 18, 33-4
Workhouse, 65
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