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51
The Judgment was as follows : —
The Lord Chief Justice: To deal first for the moment with the
case of Kershaw v. London, Midland & Scottish Railway Company, that
is a case stated by the learned Stipendiary Magistrate sitting at
Marylebone. It arises out of two Informations preferred by the
Appellant, the Senior Sanitary Inspector for the Metropolitan Borough
of Hampstead, against the Respondents, the London, Midland &
Scottish Railway Company, upon which two summonses were granted.
It is not necessary that I should read more than one. The first is
"that they, the Respondents, did fix a water closet in the right hand
apartment of a Indies' convenience at South Hampstead Station on the
street level of such premises and did connect the same to a soil-pipe
which is itself in connection with another water closet and did fail to
cause the trap of such water closet to be ventilated contrary to Drainage
Bye-law No. 17 in that behalf made by the London County Council in
pursuance of the Metropolis Management, Act, 1855, Section 202."
The second summons is like unto it, except that, I think, "left-hand" is
substituted for " right-hand."
It is not necessary that I should recapitulate the facts of the case.
I refer only to one somewhat important finding of fact which appears
in paragraph 10 (H) xxx. The learned Magistrate found as a fact
"that the exercise by the Appellant of the rights conferred upon the
Borough Council by the Metropolis Management Act, 1855, and by
the Bye-laws made thereunder, would or might cause inconvenience
and/or danger to the working by the Railway Company of the traffic
on their lines; but the exercise by the Appellant of the said rights
with reference to the said water-closets would not have caused any
such inconvenience or danger." Having heard the evidence, the
learned Magistrate dismissed the Informations, and this Case is stated
in order to raise the question whether the learned Magistrate was right
in the opinion expressed in it, that each of the contentions of the
Respondents upon the facts proved before him was right. He found
not merely that one of those contentions was right; but that all of
them were right. They are as follows: "That the interference with
and control of the Respondent's premises and works involved in the
exercise of the powers of the Metropolis Management Act, 1855,
hereinbefore mentioned, are inconsistent with the powers conferred upon
the Respondents by the London and North Western Railway Act, 1912,