View report page

194
The pipe draining Mr. Johnson's twelve houses in the Eccles case
is clearly a sewer. The only difference between it and the pipe
draining Mr. Jackson's twelve houses in the Wimbledon case is that
the Wimbledon sewer runs along the backs of the houses, while the
Eccles sewer runs beneath the houses.
If, then, in the Wood Green case Mr. Joseph's houses are not
connected with the single private drain, owing to the intervention of
the sewers C D, surely by the same reasoning in the Eccles case
Mr. Johnson's houses are not connected with the single private drain
under Mr. Thompson's houses, owing to the intervention of the sewer
passing under the passage way separating the Thompson block from the
nearest Johnson block. Further, if Mr. Johnson's houses are not
connected with the single private drain under Mr. Thompson's houses
(by the Wood Green decision), then, as Mr. Thompson is the only
other owner using the so-called single private drain, it is not a case
where two or more houses belonging to different owners are connected
with a sewer by a single private drain, therefore Section 19 does not
apply. Therefore the drain is not a single private drain. Therefore
the decision in the Eccles case was unsound.
On the other hand, if the decision in the Eccles case was sound,
if the drain under Mr. Thompson's houses is a single private drain,
because several houses belonging to another owner are connected to it
by a sewer, then the decision in the Wood Green case must be
unsound.
How the Court can avoid this dilemma it is difficult to see.
Some curious speculations arise out of the Wood Green decision.
Mr. Joseph being relieved of liability as to cost of repairing the single
private drain, upon whom shall the £49 be apportioned by the
Surveyor. Shall he divide it among the other owners, or shall he
apportion that amount upon the Council, that is, upon the ratepayers
generally? It is obviously unfair to make the adjoining owners pay