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85
Report of Medical Officer of Health.]
rate "or sum due" to the company under the Company's Act, the company may recover the same,
with costs, in any court of competent jurisdiction," and their remedy under the present Section shall
be in addition to their other remedies for the recovery thereof."
The power to cut off the supply on the failure to pay on the part of a person liable for the
rate, not being the person supplied, is now limited by Section 4 of the Water Companies (Regulation
of Powers) Act, 1887. By that Section, when the owner of any house is liable "by law or by
agreement with the water company" for the payment of the rates for water supplied to such
dwelling-house, or part thereof if occupied separately, and subsequently fails to pay the water-rate,
the supply cannot be cut off, and the rate, plus interest computed at 5 per cent, per annum,
commencing at the end of a month after the rate falls due, becomes a first charge on the premises
affected, and may be recovered either from the occupier by requiring him to pay to the company so
much of the rent as may be due or be sufficient to liquidate the debt, or from the owner or occupier
by ordinary process of the courts. Should the company cut off the water, a penalty of £5 for every
day during which the supply is off may be recovered from the company.
Certain companies have abandoned the practice of cutting off the water supply for the nonpayment
of rates, recovering them as debts in the County Courts.
By Section 49 Sub-Section 1 of the Public Health (London) Act, 1891, a company cutting off
the supply, for any cause, from an inhabited dwelling-house, must give notice thereof in writing to
the Sanitary Authority within four-and-twenty hours of stopping the water supply. (Such notices
are dealt with as complaints, and entered into the book kept pursuant to Section 107 (3) of that
Act. It is the duty of the Inspectors to examine this book daily, initial their proper entries, and
investigate the complaints made.) By Section 48 (1) of the same Act, an occupied house without a
proper and sufficient water supply is a nuisance which can be dealt with summarily. If notice
under Section 4 (1) of the Act to supply such house be not complied with within the time specified,
the Court can, under Sections 5 (7) and 48 (1) of the Act, close the house and impose a
penalty not exceeding £20.
One curious difficulty has occurred in connection with the cutting off of water, in the case of
houses about to be demolished. In a case reported by the Medical Officer of Health of Kensington,
the owner, who was liable for the water-rate, gave his tenants notice to quit, which they ignored.
The owner thereupon requested the water company to cut off the supply, which was accordingly
done. The tenants still continuing to occupy the houses, grave nuisance was caused by the closets,
&c., becoming choked. The tenants were in illegal occupation, consequently Section 4 of the
"Water Companies (Regulation of Powers) Act, 1887, did not apply. There remained for the local
authority the lengthy process of getting the nuisance abated by the usual process of notice,
summons, and fine.
Storage Cisterns.—The abolition of all cisterns for storing water for dietic purposes has
been very strongly urged in the past few years. It is argued that cisterns are only too frequently
sources of pollution, and that the supply is almost universally constant and cisterns therefore
unnecessary. Both these arguments are true; but against them can be set other considerations, the
most important being the interruption in the supply due to accidents, repairs, &c. As the law
now stands, cisterns are obligatory, as will be seen by the following Sections:—
By Section 54 of 10 Yic., c. 17 (Waterworks Clauses Act, 1847), it is provided that where
there is no obligation on a Water Company to provide a constant supply, the persons supplied with
water " shall, when required by the undertakers, provide a proper cistern to hold the water with
which he shall be so supplied," with all necessary taps and fittings.
This Section is incorporated in the Private Acts of all the Metropolitan Companies.
All the Companies, with one exception [the Kent Company (?)] have in their Private Acts a
Section to the following effect:—*
* The tvorda are from Sec. xlii. of 15 and 16 Vic., o. clvii. (Grand Junction Waterworks Act, 1852).