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officer of health, or by any two legally qualified medical practitioners, or by
any ten inhabitants of the district of the authority, to be a nuisance or
injurious or dangerous to the health of any of the inhabitants of the district
(whether the premises are situate in or outside the district or the county),
the authority shall make a complaint to a petty sessional court within whose
jurisdiction the premises are situate; and if it appears to the court that the
trade, business, process or manufacture carried on by the respondent is a nuisance,
or causes effluvia which are a nuisance or injurious or dangerous to the
health of any of the inhabitants, then, unless it is shown that the respondent
has used the best practicable means for abating the nuisance or preventing or
counteracting the effluvia, the person so offending shall, if he is the owner
or occupier of the premises or a foreman or other person employed by the owner
or occupier, be liable to a fine not exceeding fifty pounds:
Provided that the court may suspend its final determination on condition
that the respondent undertakes to adopt, within a reasonable time, such means
as the court may deem practicable, and order to be carried into effect, for
abating the nuisance or mitigating or preventing the injurious effects of the
effluvia.
SECTION 147 requires every furnace used in the working of engines by steam, and
every furnace used in any public bath or washhouse, or in any mill, factory,
printing house, dyehouse, iron foundry, glasshouse, distillery, brewhouse,
sugar refinery, bakehouse, gasworks, waterworks or other building used for the
purpose of trade or manufacture (although a steam engine is not used therein),
to be constructed so as to consume or burn as far as practicable the smoke
arising from the furnace, and provides for penalties against any person
(a) using any furnace which is not constructed so as to consume or burn
as far as practicable the smoke arising therefrom;
(b) so negligently using any such furnace that the smoke arising therefrom
is not effectively consumed or burnt; or
(c) carrying on any trade or business which occasions any noxious or
offensive effluvia, or otherwise annoys the neighbourhood or inhabitants,
without using the best practicable means for preventing or
counteracting the effluvia or annoyance,
SECTION 148 defines smoke nuisances which may be dealt with summarily under the
Act as
(a) any fireplace or furnace which does not, as far as practicable, consume
the smoke arising from the combustible used therein, and which
is used for working engines by steam, or in any mill, factory, dyehouse,
brewery, bakehouse or gaswork, or in any manufacturing or
trade process whatsoever:
(b) any chimney (not being the chimney of a private dwelling house or the
chimney of a ship habitually used as a seagoing ship) sending forth
smoke in such a quantity as to be a nuisance; and
(c) any chimney of a ship habitually used as a sea-going ship sending
forth black smoke in such a quantity as to be a nuisance,
and sets out the following defences available to a person prosecuted under this
section:
(a) the fireplace or furnace is constructed in such manner as to consume
as far as practicable, having regard to the nature of the manufacture
or trade, all smoke arising therefrom, and that the fireplace or
furnace has been carefully attended to by the person having charge
thereof; and
(b) he has used the best practicable means for preventing the nuisance,
having regard to the cost and to local conditions and circumstances.
The meaning given to the following expressions should be noted:-
(a) "best practicable means" refers not only to efficiency of the plant
but also to the manner in which it is handled.