HIGHWAYS (AMENDMENT) BILL (Hansard, 22 June 1965)

§ LORD CHESHAM
My Lords, this Bill, which I am going to ask your Lordships to read a second time, is a modest measure, dealing with a small point, but one which, as I shall hope to show, has definite usefulness to the community. 491 Section 129 of the Highways Act, 1959, provides that if there is an obstacle on the highway resulting from the accumulation of snow or anything else the highway authority shall cause it to be removed. That, I think, is acceptable to everybody and this Bill preserves that provision. But Section 129 also provides that the highway authority shall cause the obstruction to be removed within 24 hours, if a notice is served upon them to do so by a justice of the peace. This means that if a justice receives a complaint about an obstruction and finds that the complaint is valid he has no option but to serve notice, and he has no discretion whatever to extend the time limit beyond 24 hours.
What this provision can mean was shown in the Borough of Barnes in January, 1963. There a householder complained of a small heap of snow lying outside his house in the road—as a matter of fact, it turned out to be outside somebody else's house, but I am not going to tell your Lordships the whole story unless I am asked to do so. He rightly complained and the local magistrates found that they must serve notice to the borough council, which they did. But, at the same time, they expressed concern at the situation that could arise if many different complaints of the same kind were made, because then the authority would be spending their time removing little heaps of snow outside houses instead of getting on with clearing the streets to the general benefit of the public. The resources of local authorities for clearing snow are necessarily limited. Even with the most up-to-date equipment, it is physically impossible to clear every road within a town area within 24 hours, especially if, as happened at Barnes, it is also freezing.
What is needed is that, when making an order, the magistrates should be able to take into account the size of the task that the highway authority faces and the requirements of an efficient programme of work and be able to give priority where priority is needed. The Bill indicates the kind of things they should have in mind and it would give the magistrates discretion to make such an order as they thought reasonable in the circumstances. If this happens, they would be free from the possible dilemma of having to satisfy the complaint of an individual at the expense of the rights of others, either 492 other individuals or the public at large. Of course, the individual retains his rights just the same. I think that this small measure will commend itself to your Lordships. I certainly commend it, and beg to move that the Bill be now read a second time.

§ THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, MINISTRY OF TRANSPORT (LORD LINDGREN)
My Lords, I am sure that the whole House is most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Chesham, for his brief but very lucid description of the Bill and the necessity for it. May I assure your Lordships that this Bill is welcomed by Her Majesty's Government and also by every highway authority in the country? Therefore, I commend it to your Lordships for Second Reading.

§ LORD AIREDALE
My Lords, may I mention one matter which I think is rather a curiosity—the manner in which the minds of the draftsmen who draft Bills seem to work? Here we have the case of a draftsman thinking of the different ways in which a road is liable to be obstructed. He thinks of a fall of snow and mentions that; he thinks also of the collapse of a cutting and puts in the falling down of banks on the side of the highway". But I think that that is a very unlikely and unusual occurrence. Then he apparently does not think of what most of us would regard as an ordinary, everyday cause of obstruction: the blowing down of trees in a gale. That is omitted. Then apparently the draftsman says to himself that he cannot think of all those things, so puts in "or from any other cause", and that is that. I should have thought that a draftsman should either try to make a comprehensive catalogue or else say that it is beyond him to think of all these things and just put in the words, "from any cause", and leave it at that. I do not expect the noble Lord, Lord Lindgren, to give an answer this afternoon, but it is a matter which I have never quite understood. Perhaps some day I shall be told what the answer is.

§ LORD LINDGREN
My Lords, I cannot answer for the workings of the minds of Parliamentary draftsmen. I sometimes have some difficulty in answering 493 for my own! But there are many sections of the 1959 Act which I think most people, particularly those associated with local government, would like to amend. So far as the Ministry are concerned, we agree with that, and we are going to try to bring in an amending Bill. The question of a falling tree comes under another section and it is not dealt with in this manner. The problem here is that the magistrates in this case, as the noble Lord, Lord Chesham, said—this goes back to the year 1835—when they came to make their judgment, said: "This is the law, and we cannot help ourselves. We think it is silly, and it ought to be altered." We are altering it in relation to this one point, and we will bring in an amending Bill for the others later.

§ LORD CHESHAM
My Lords, I do not think there is any more that I need to say, in view of the explanation given by the noble Lord, Lord Lindgren, except to express the view finally that, on the whole, it is probably true that Parliamentary draftsmen do their work in the way that we are told because otherwise the noble Lord, Lord Airedale, would not have so much to talk about on these occasions. I should like to thank your Lordships for giving this Bill a Second Reading.