§ Clause 25, page 22, line 19, leave out ("either,") and insert:
- ("(a) to carry a heavy locomotive; or
- (b) to carry a light locomotive; or")
§ Earl RUSSELL had given Notice that he would move to disagree. The noble Earl Said: My Lords, you will see that there is a Government Amendment put down to disagree with a portion of the Commons Amendments here. The Amendments with which it is proposed to disagree were made on the Report stage to an interim form of the subsection resulting from Amendments on the Committee stage. It is now proposed to revert to the interim form of paragraphs (a) and (b), arid the Amendments have to be considered in connection with the proviso in the subsection which is also to be amended and which limits the maximum weight which may be specified in a notice.
§ A difficulty in connection with the clause is that the maximum permissible weight of a locomotive drawing three laden trailers is very high. It is in the neighbourhood of sixty tons, and under the clause as it stood it would have been open to the bridge authority to put a notice on the bridge to the effect that the bridge was incapable of carrying a load exceeding, say, forty tons. It is not considered desirable that weights in the 840 neighbourhood of sixty tons should be specified by notices. As the clause stands a bridge could still be closed to heavy locomotives because it was insufficient to carry the maximum permissible weight. The best way out of the difficulty is thought to be to make regulations limiting the maximum aggregate of the locomotive and trailer which may be drawn over a bridge without the consent of the authority. The Amendment proposed by line 38 will enable the maximum weight to be limited accordingly. The other Amendments of the clause are of a drafting and consequential character. I beg to move that this House doth disagree with the Amendment.
§ Moved, That this House doth disagree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(Earl Russell.)
§ On Question, Motion agreed to, and Amendment disagreed to accordingly.