THIRD READING. (Hansard, 27 July 1858)

THE EARL OF CARNARVON
to add at the end of Clause 44— In any District where the provisions of the said Act for the Prevention of Smoke are not now in force in which the Local Board shall resolve that any one or more of such processes should be exempted from penalties for not consuming all Smoke for any time specified in such Resolution, not exceeding ten years, which may be annually renewed for a similar or any shorter period, if the Board shall think fit; and any Justice or Justices before whom any person shall be summoned may remit the Penalty in any Case within such District 2153 in which he or they shall be of opinion that such person has adopted the best known means for preventing any nuisance from smoke, and has carefully attended to the same, so as to consume as far as possible the smoke arising from any process so exempted during such time as any such resolution shall extend to, unless an order shall be issued by one of Her Majesty's Principal Secretaries of State directing that such exemption shall no longer be continued in such district to such processes or any of them after a time specified in such order.

§ LORD REDESDALE
opposed the Amendment, and drew attention to the provisions of the clause incorporated in the Bill the clauses of the Towns Improvement Act (1847) with respect to the prevention of smoke, subject to the qualification that they should not extend to any of the following processes—namely, the coking of coal, the calcining of ironstone or limestone, the making or burning of bricks, earthenware, quarries, tiles, or pipes, the raising of any mines or minerals, the smelting of iron ores, the refining, puddling, shingling, and rolling of iron or other metals, or to the melting and casting of iron into castings, or to the manufacture of glass. The noble Lord said that the effect of this qualification would be practically to repeal those beneficial clauses in the Towns Improvement Act which compelled a great variety of noxious trades to consume their own smoke. Because the great manufacturers who were engaged in these trades choose to say that they could not consume their smoke, they were to be exempted under this Bill without any sufficient cause being shown, and the result would be to thing the smoke nuisance into many places where it had not existed before. He remembered, when they first attempted to legislate upon this subject, that the potteries on the south side of the river declared that they would not be able to carry on their business if they were compelled to construct smoke-consuming furnaces; but experience had proved that there was really no practical ground for these exemptions. He moved that the whole of the qualification should be omitted from the clause.

§ THE EARL OF DERBY
defended the clause, on the ground that if it were altered as proposed it would lead to a great interference with private rights.

§ LORD REDESDALE
pressed his objection, and urged at all events that earthen-ware works should be excluded from the exemption.

THE EARL OF CARNARVON
refused to alter the clause.

§ LORD REDESDALE
Then I warn your Lordships that this Bill is a mistake, and that it will throw the greatest obstacle in the way of the consumption of smoke that can well be devised. After the passing of this Bill we shall rapidly fall into every one of the old nuisances with regard to smoke from which, after many years of struggling, we have at length succeeded in emancipating ourselves.

§ THE DUKE OF NEWCASTLE
suggested that it would be prudent not to pass the Bill at present. It was all very well to say that private interests were concerned. No doubt they were; but they were concerned in bringing back a most objectionable nuisance. He reminded their Lordships that when they began to legislate upon this subject every trade without exception declared that it would be impossible to conduct its business if it were compelled to consume its own smoke. Step by step, however, trade after trade had been drawn within the meshes of the law, until at last all had found that they were able to do what the law required. He earnestly entreated the House not to take any retrograde step in this matter, and not to exempt any trade which was at present within the law for the prevention of smoke. If they did they would have all their work to do over again, and it might be years before they could pass an effectual Smoke Prevention Act. The difficulty in which they now found themselves involved afforded another illustration of the inconvenience of deferring important measures of this nature to so late a period of the Session.

THE DUKE OF BUCCLEUCH
also expressed a hope that some Amendment would be made in this Bill to compel manufactories in large towns to consume their own smoke.

§ THE EARL OF DERBY
suggested that the passing of the Bill should be postponed until to-morrow, in order that an Amendment might be agreed on which would carry out the object desired.