HC Deb 17 October 1950 vol 478 cc1898-901
Mr. Powell

I beg to move, in page 3, line 25, to leave out "if the street," and to insert: in respect of any portion of the street which. This Amendment, and that which follows to line 29, are both drafting but they are necessary in order to avoid a result which I do not believe was intended. As the subsection is drafted, we may suppose a street two miles in length with a bridge crossing it at the extreme end. It may be desired to break up, say, half a mile of the other end of that street. Surely it is unreasonable that in respect of that operation the transport authorities should be the authority or managers concerned under the Street Works Code? Therefore this Amendment seeks to restrict the scope of the transport authority concerned with the bridge to that section of the street which is reasonably affected by the fact that the bridge passes over or under it.

The Attorney-General

As the hon. Member has said, it is a question of drafting although it raises a not unimportant point. I hope to satisfy him however, whilst agreeing entirely with the object he has in view, that his Amendment is unnecessary to achieve it. When the Bill refers to a street it means only that part of the street where the undertakers are to do their works, or where they have apparatus which might be affected by the works of others. Of course, as the hon. Member pointed out, one might have streets which, in the colloquial and, quite correctly, in other senses, may be two miles long or even much longer than that. Watling Street goes on for miles and miles.

Mr. Higgs

It goes right through my constituency.

The Attorney-General

It goes not only right through the hon. Member's constituency, but very wisely passes on. Although it is true that in one sense roads of that kind may form a continuous street, they are not streets for the purposes of this Bill; only the material part of the street is a street for the purpose of this Bill.

The hon. Member will see that in Clause 1 (3), "street" is defined as meaning "any length of a highway," and the whole of the Bill—there are other Clauses, I think, on which the same point arises—is drawn so that in its context no other interpretation could be put upon the matter. If we were to introduce, as the hon. Member suggests, some such phrase as "a portion of a street," we should get into trouble all through the subsequent part of the Bill.

We have given very careful consideration to this in conjunction with Parliamentary Counsel and we feel quite clear that the point is already covered by the Bill. Indeed, the object which the hon. Member has in mind could not be satisfactorily achieved in any other way than that in which we have attempted to achieve it in the present draft of the Bill. Only that part of a street to which street works are to be done is a street for the purpose of the street works code. The fact that the street goes on and past the hon. Member's constituency does not mean that the authorities in other parts of the street, in the wider sense, would have any concern in the matter at all.

Mr. Higgs

The right hon. and learned Gentleman has dealt in part, but not completely, with the query of my hon. Friend My hon. Friend put the proposition of a street with a bridge at one end and excavations at the other. To such a case as that, the answer which the right hon. and learned Gentleman has given is complete; but what happens with a street, colloquially speaking, of considerable length with a bridge in the middle, where the whole of the street is to be subject to works and an electric main is to be laid along its whole length? As I understand it, at present the authority responsible for the bridge—the railway or canal authority—could say that they would do the whole work for the whole length of the street because one short part of the excavations passed under their bridge. The answer from the right hon. and learned Gentleman does not quite cover this point, which was really what we had in mind in tabling the Amendment.

Mr. Hay

I want to follow up the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Mr. Higgs) and to reply to the point made by the right hon. and learned Gentleman. I understood his argument to be that the only part of a street with which anyone would be concerned was that part which was being excavated, and that for all practical purposes—and, indeed, technically in the Bill—that is all that anyone is concerned with.

I have been unable to find any definition in any part of the Bill, except in Clause 1 (3), which defines "street" in terms as "any length of a highway." That particular form of words would completely carry my hon. Friend's case, because "any length of a highway" could be any length, in fact. It could be a few yards, or it could be a hundred miles. "Any length" is a rather loose expression and I would have preferred a form of words similar to that contained in the Amendment—"that part" or "that portion of a street." I ask the Minister again to consider this point once more.

I know that there has been a great deal of discussion, as the Attorney-General said, with Parliamentary Counsel, and I hesitate to differ from them—I should be very foolish indeed to try to do so—but there is a certain looseness of wording here would could be tightened up. This is to be a statute containing a number of penal Clauses; there are penalties for breaches of various things, and it must be clear beyond any kind of doubt exactly what is meant by a "street."

The Attorney-General

I will certainly look into the point again. I am always glad to look at anything twice, and many things more than twice. My present opinion is that the points raised by the hon. Members are really covered by the Bill as drafted. In Clause 10 (1), which deals with the election which may take place, the street to which the election applies still remains that part which affects the authority in question and no more If the word "street" wherever it appears is read in its context, it can, I think, only be interpreted to mean that part of the street which is affected by the works being undertaken in each particular case; that part of the street which is the concern of the authority, on the one hand, and the undertaker, on the other hand, in regard to the proposed work. I will, however, look at this question again in reference to the points which have been put forward.

Mr. Hay

Would the right hon. and learned Gentleman perhaps consider inserting on the Report stage a further subsection to use the very wording which he has just given, so that there is no doubt at all about the matter?

The Attorney-General

I will certainly consider that, but we feel—and we have given a good deal of thought to this—that once we start doing that we shall get into trouble in other Clauses. If we think that we can have some consistent form of words without putting in a different definition in each Clause, we will do so, but I hope that the hon. Member, on looking at the point again, will feel that it really is covered.

Mr. Powell

In view of the explanation and assurance of the right hon. and learned Gentleman, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.