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48
or otherwise as they may think fit, provided that nothing in the
Bill shall be deemed to authorise Metropolitan Borough Councils.
to manufacture fittings or apparatus. The Bill also provided that
every such Council should so adjust the charges to be made
by them as to meet the expenditure for this purpose (including
interest upon moneys borrowed and payments to sinking fund in
respect thereof), and that every sum charged by any Borough
Council to a consumer in respect of the wiring and fitting of
premises should be clearly stated on every demand note for electrical
energy supplied to the consumer distinct from the charge for
such energy, and that the total sums received and expended should
be separately shown in the published accounts of the Electric
Lighting Undertaking of the Borough Council.
63. The Bill also provided that in any case where a registered
medical practitioner renders professional services on being summoned
pursuant to the requirement of any rule for the time being
in force made by the Central Midwives Board established under
"The Midwives Act, 1902," and where the County Council has
reason to believe that the patient or person liable to maintain her
is unable to pay the whole or any part of the fee of a medical
practitioner the County Council may pay the whole or part of
such fee, provided that if it shall appear to the Council that the
circumstances of the patient or of the person liable to maintain
her are such that such patient or person can or could have paid
the whole or any part of the amount paid by the Council, the
Council may recover such amount in a summary manner, and that
payment by the County Council of a fee or part of a fee shall not
subject the patient on whose behalf such payment was made, or
the person liable by law to maintain her, to any electoral or other
like disability.
64. With regard to the proposed ambulance service this
Council in June, 1904, presented a petition to the London County
Council for the insertion of a clause in the County Council's (General
Powers) Bill giving Metropolitan Borough Councils power to
provide ambulances, and in January last the Council urged upon
the County Council the necessity of providing horse-drawn ambulances
at all its fire stations in this Borough for use in case of
accidents by fire and other accidents and illnesses needing speedy
hospital treatment, payment for the use of same to be left to the
discretion of the County Council.