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Amendment proposed—
Page 27, line 43, at end, add—
(4) If two or more urban districts determine, by resolution passed by a majority of three-fourths of each council, to amalgamate
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and to combine their respective districts into one united district, the Local Government Board for Ireland shall make an order for such amalgamation and union on such conditions and subject to such provisions as the Board may deem just and the councils may approve.
Should the council of such united district determine, by resolution to be carried by a like majority at a meeting of which seven days' notice at the least shall have been given to each member thereof, to have their district formed into a county borough, the Local Government Board shall, if the rateable value of such united district be not less than one hundred thousand pounds, and its population according to the next preceding census be not less than twenty-five thousand, make an order constituting the said district a county borough, subject to the provisions of this Act as to the adjustment of debts, property, and liabilities.
Any urban district council may, with the consent of the Local Government Board, and with the consent of the council, by a three-fourths majority of the district proposed to be annexed, extend their boundaries by annexing any adjoining district not included within the jurisdiction of any urban district council, subject to such conditions as the Board with the approval of said council may deem just."—(Viscount de Vesci.)
* VISCOUNT DE VESCIThe Amendment enables two or more urban, district councils to combine by resolution. I take the opportunity of moving this Amendment in consequence of a Report of a Commission appointed as long ago as 1880, when the Duke of Marlborough was Lord Lieutenant, to inquire into municipal boundaries. A portion of it relates to the townships outside Dublin, and my object in moving this Amendment is to secure that the Report and recommendations of that Commission shall be carried into effect now, and that these townships shall be saved the expense of the promotion of a private Bill for that purpose. It is mainly on account of these townships around Dublin that I put this Amendment down, and I hope that the Government may be inclined to accept it.
§ * THE LORD CHANCELLOR OF IRELANDThis is a branch of one of the most serious and burning questions that can be suggested. I know myself that for generations there has been no more tremendous or more burning question than this of the townships and the city. This question was discussed several times in the House of Commons, but it wag laid down that this was a controversy that must stand over, and be fought out 147 on independent lines, and that it could not be grappled with in a paragraph of a Local Government Bill dealing with a general form of local government. It must be fought out between themselves. The city has its views, and the townships have their views. They are both rich and independent, and proud and courageous bodies, and whenever the fight takes place they must go for it resolutely, and with all the grandeur of a separate Bill for themselves.
§ * THE LORD CHANCELLOR OF IRELANDThey are rolling in money. It would be quite out of place to put this tremendous topic of the Dublin townships against the city, and the city against the townships, in a Bill like this. For these reasons I trust that the noble Lord will not press the Amendment.
§ Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.