GLASGOW CORPORATION ORDER CONFIRMATION BILL. [H.L.] (Hansard, 14 August 1919)

§ LORD HYLTON

My Lords, before moving that this Bill do pass, I have to submit an Amendment to leave out Clause 26. The circumstances are as follow. This Order provides, among other things, for the construction of a new tramway situated in the county of Renfrew outside of the City of Glasgow. General Order No. 130 under the Procedure Act repeats Standing Order of House of Commons 170 A and Standing Order of House of Lords 133. Its general effect is that where a local authority gets power to construct and work tramways beyond its own district, Commissioners are to insert a clause in the Order on the lines of Section 43 of the Tramways Act, 1870, which gives a power to the local authority of the district into which the tramway is carried to purchase the tramway after twenty-one 880 years; with power, however, to prescribe a period not exceeding forty-two years.

In conformity with this General Order the Commissioners on inquiry into the Provisional Order inserted Clause 26, applying the provisions of Section 43 of the Tramways Act to the intended tramway. Under prior local legislation affecting the Glasgow tramway system the Corporation enjoy a permanent right to own and work tramways outside the city. In the cases of the Glasgow Corporation (Tramways and General) Order, 1901, the Glasgow Corporation (Tramways, &c.) Order, 1904, the Glasgow (Tramways Consolidation) Order, 1905, and the Glasgow Corporation Order, 1912, clauses applying Section 43 of the Tramways Act were omitted before the final confirmation of these Orders by Parliament.

Having regard to these precedents, to the relative unimportance of the intended outside line and its uselessness apart from the rest of the system, to the advantage of uniformity and to the consent of the local authority concerned, the Secretary for Scotland thinks that this tramway may be exempted from the operation of Section 43 of the Tramways Act. The Secretary for Scotland, in accordance with the precedents set in 1901, 1904, 1905 and 1912 in similar circumstances, proposes by Amendment in the House to omit. Clause 26, the result of which will be that the Corporation will own and work the tramway referred to in perpetuity.