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32
The Bill has now become an Act known as the Clean Air Act 1956
and received Royal Assent in July, 1956.
The main purposes of the Act can be summarised as follows
(1) To prohibit the emission of dark smoke
(2) To prohibit the installation of industrial furnaces which do
not consume their own smoke.
(3) To minimise the emission of grit and dust from existing and
new industrial furnaces,
(4) The establishment of Smoke Control Areas,
The various provisions of the Act will come into force, as and
when "appointed days'" are fixed by the Minister.
Since the Act received Royal Assent certain of its provisions
became law on 31st December, 1956 viz
Section 3. Requirement that new furnaces shall so far as practicable,
be smokeless,
Section 4. Gives the Minister power to make regulations regarding
apparatus for measuring the density of smoke.
Section 10, Enables the Local Authority to regulate the height of
chimneys,
Section 11 12 etc. Empowers Local Authorities to declare their
area or part of it, Smoke Control Areas,
It would appear to be the Minister's intention that the
appointed day in respect of the emission of "dark smoke" from
chimneys shall not be until 1958.
In this respect therefore the Clean Air Act will not produce
any spectacular results. Persistent offenders will continue to
enjoy the apparent weakness of existing law.
The new powers available for creating Smoke Control Areas will
require to be carefully considered. They are in a measure,
similar to the power in the Tottenham Corporation Act 1952, The
Clean Air Act however recognises that complete smokelessness in
an area may not be possible,
This part of the Act contains important financial provisions
whereby the local authority are required to make grants for the
conversion or adaptation of fireplaces. In turn the local
authority will obtain financial assistance from the Exchequer.