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236
In 1883 the subject was prominently before your Vestry, and
a resolution was passed, on the recommendation of the Works, &c.,
Committee, to the effect:—
"That the sections of the (Water) Acts conferring on the Water
Companies the power of cutting off the water from premises should be
repealed, such other powers, to enable the Companies to recover rates
or make good fittings, being substituted, as to the wisdom of Parliament
shall be deemed equitable and fitting."
Nothing came of it, however, at that time or on some other
occasions, supported though the action of your Vestry was by
other Sanitary Authorities.
Advantage was taken of the sitting of the Royal Commission
on the Housing of the Working Classes, to send to every member
of the Commission a copy of my Reports, &c., on the cutting-off case
adverted to above, with the effect that, in their Report (1885), the
Commission recommended that the Companies be deprived of the
summary power to cut-off the water supply. Your Vestry supported
a Bill brought in by Lord Camperdown (1885) intended to
settle the question, but it being thought that the Companies had
had their own way too much, in moulding the Bill in Committee in
the House of Lords, it was thrown out in the Commons. In 1887
a very useful measure, Water Companies (Regulation of Powers)
was introduced by Mr. Forrest Fulton and became law. Your
Vestry petitioned the House of Commons in its favour. It is
an Act to "limit the powers of the Water Companies to cut
off the tenants' water supply where the rate is paid by the
landlord." It makes provision for treating the water-rate as a
debt to be recovered—primarily, after notice to pay—from the
occupier, who is entitled to deduct the amount paid to the
Company out of the rent due, or that may next become due from
him, when the owner and not the occupier is liable, by law or
agreement with the Company, for the payment of the rate, which
is to be a charge on the dwelling-house in priority to all other
charges affecting the premises. The Act, therefore, as regards a
very large number of houses gives effect to the views expressed in
my Reports of 1883 and subsequently.