Captain MURRAYI beg to ask leave to introduce the Motor Traffic (Street Noises) Bill. The Bill is specially intended 979 to remedy a grievance to which on several occasions by question and by speech I have called attention in this House. I refer to the difficulties experienced by residents in London and other urban areas in obtaining a due amount of sleep owing to the excessive and varied nature of the noises made by instruments of warning on motor vehicles. This, then, is no imaginary grievance conjured up by a disordered brain. Since I first addressed a question to the President of the Local Government Board I have received many letters from people all over London asking mo to press the matter. I venture to think that the columns of the daily Press during the last week or so are themselves sufficient proof that this matter is one that calls for immediate remedy. From all quarters of London come complaints—from eminent surgeons, doctors, business men, and others. More important still, they come from many people in London who are in feeble health, whose nerves are shattered, and for whom sleep is very difficult, if not impossible, owing to the hideous noises which the warning signals of motor-cars make during the night, and well on into the early hours of the morning. What is the remedy? I think it is quite possible that much can be done without legislation by those who use motor-vehicles; if they will compel the drivers of motor-cars to keep their cars under such control as will obviate the necessity of hooting loudly at each corner which they reach in the course of their travels. Yes, hut that is not all. One of the chief reasons militating against peaceful and restful slumber is to be found in the varied nature of the sounds which these warning instruments emit.
Shrieks, hoots, whistles, and groans are intermingled with other weird and distressing sounds, some of which recall to memory the pleasantries attendant on a rough passage across the Channel. It is to apply a remedy in respect to the varied nature of the sounds emitted by the warning instruments that I ask the House to pass to-day the First Reading of this Bill. I addressed a question yesterday to the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board, asking him if he would take steps to compel all motors in urban areas to use a bell as a warning note between the hours of twelve midnight and seven a.m.; and the right hon. Gentleman replied that in view of the terms of Section 3 of the Locomotives on Highways Act, 1896, legislation would be necessary 980 to give effect to my suggestion. I propose to supply the right hon. Gentleman with that legislation. It appears that he has no power to say what description of warning instrument shall or shall not be used. The purpose of this Bill, which is a very short one, and very simple, is to give powers to the Local Government Board to make regulations defining the nature of the warning devices which may or may not be used in certain areas at certain times within the twenty-four hours. I suggest under this Bill that general powers in regard to the matter should be given to the Local Government Board, and I further suggest that under those powers the President of the Local Government Board should frame regulations making it impossible, for instance, for any exhaust blown instrument to be sounded in London at any time in the twenty-four hours, and in particular during the night. The Bill would also allow the President of the Local Government Board to carry out the suggestion conveyed in my question of yesterday—to introduce some uniformity into the sounds omitted by these instruments by compelling motor vehicles in London during the night to carry and sound a bell. Those are the main, and, in fact, the only provisions of this Bill. I trust, in view of the great annoyance caused to the many residents in urban areas owing to the excessive hooting of motor-cars, that the House will give mo the First Reading of this Bill.
Bill ordered to be brought in by Captain Murray, Mr. Fell, Sir Henry Havelock Allan, and Mr. Whitehouse. Presented accordingly, and read the first time; to be read a second time upon Thursday, 20th July, and to be printed.