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202
In a contrast of the intermittent and constant service
systems, the Water Examiner observes that "the intermittent
charging of the service pipes favours corrosion, which, in turn,
causes turbidity; while the shutting oft' of the water from the
service mains, and their depletion by the gravitation of the water
into basement cisterns, or by leakage, tends to create a vacuum
into which may be drawn either foul air or foul water. These
evils are avoided by the constant service; but this necessitates
the provision of well constructed house fittings .... in order
to avoid the enormous waste from leakage which would otherwise
ensue .... Apprehension of the sometimes considerable cost of
the alterations required to adapt existing houses to the requirements
of constant service, due to the generally inferior condition
of the fittings, has in some degree checked the extension of the
system ; but it is generally admitted that when this difficulty has
been overcome .... the result has been found to be, on the
whole, satisfactory alike to the consumers and to the Water
Companies. Constant supply seems to conduce on the whole to
economy in the use of water. The control of the supply, however,
is virtually surrendered to the consumers, but when good house
fittings are insisted on and maintained, the privilege is not as a
rule abused."
The Act prescribes three modes by which a constant supply
of water may be obtained : (1) Any Company may propose to
give it; (2) the Metropolitan Authority (County Council) may
call upon a Company to provide it; (3) failing the above, and
under certain conditions, the Local Government Board may require
it. In general the constant supply has been voluntarily given
by the Companies; neither the Metropolitan Authority in the
past (the Metropolitan Board of Works), nor the Local Government
Board, nor the Board of Trade, whose powers are now executed
by the Local Government Board, having called upon the Companies
to provide it. The ground alleged by the (late) Metropolitan
Board for their failure to call upon the Companies to provide constant
supply, was, that the Companies had made the regulations so