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Nathan v. Rouse.
1.—Drains—Public Health—Nuisance—"Acts or defaults" of two or more
persons—Right to contribute—Public Health (London) Act, 1891, (54
and 55 Vict., c. 75,) ss. 4, 5, 120.
The defendant's premises were drained through a drain running under the
plaintiff's premises, which drain for part of its length carried only the defendant's
drainage, and for the rest of its length carried the drainage of both
premises The defendants had a right so to use the drain. A nuisance having
arisen on the plaintiff's premises owing to the whole of the drain being
defective, and permitting sewage to escape, the sanitary authority took proceedings
against him, under ss. 4 and 5 of the Public Health (London) Act,
1891, and obtained an order upon him to do the work necessary to abate the
nuisance. The plaintiff did the work and abated the nuisance, all the work
being done upon his own premises.
Held, that the plaintiff could not recover from the defendants a proportionate
part of the costs of abating the nuisance, as being one of two or more
persons "by whose act or default" the nuisance had been caused, within the
meaning of s. 120 of the Public Health (London) Act, 1891. Nathan v. Rouse.
Div. Ct. (1905), 1 K, B, 527.
Water Supply to Tenement Houses.—A Metropolitan Magistrate decided, in
a case. instituted by the Woolwich Borough Council, that a stand-pipe in a
yard at the rear of the premises was not "a proper and sufficient supply of
water "within the meaning of section 48 of the Public Health (London) Act,
1891, for a tenement house of three storeys, with six rooms, occupied by five
families. Subsequently another Metropolitan Magistrate at Marylebone Police
Court, in a case instituted by the Paddington Borough Council, held that the
words "proper and sufficient supply" referred to the source of the supply,
and not to the provision of taps within the house, and the case was dismissed
with costs against the Council, the Council having served notice on the owner
to provide water on each floor of a tenement house.