The first elections of London vestrymen and auditors and members Elections in 1894 of the Local Board of Woolwich under the Act, will be held on the 8th of November, 1894, or such later date or dates in 1894 as the Local Government Board may fix', and the persons elected will come into office on the second Thursday next after their election, or such other day not more than seven days earlier or later, as may be fixed by or in pursuance of the rules made by the Local Government Board under the Act in relation to their election (s. 84). Persons who, at the passing of the Act, are members of the Woolwich Local Board and of any Vestry under the Metropolis Management Acts, or are auditors under those Acts, are continued in office until the day on which the first members and auditors elected under the Act come into office, as if the term of office for which they were elected expired on that day, and consequently the usual annual election of such members and auditors respectively will not take place in 1894. Of the members of the Local Board and Vestries first elected under the Act, the first annual retirement will take place at the date of the annual election in the year 1896. The mode of determining those members who are to retire in 1896 and 1897 is the same as in the case of urban district councillors except that the date of the annual election is to be substituted for the 15th of April (s. 79 (3) (6) (10)). In the case of the Woolwich Local Board the annual election is in April. Continuance in office of vestrymen and members of the Board. Woolwich Local Retirement of first elected members. The first meeting of a Vestry elected under the Act and of the First meeting in Woolwich Local Board will be convened by the returning officer 1894. (s. 79 (9)). Any difficulty that arises with respect to the first meeting may be removed by an order of the County Council (s. 80 (1)). Transfer of powers of Rural Sanitary Authority. CHAPTER VIII. Power and duties of District Councils--Transfer of THE powers and duties of District Councils under the Local Government Act naturally fall into two groups, namely-the powers and duties of I. Rural District Councils. II. Urban and Rural District Councils. In the former group, the powers and duties are for the most part transferred powers and duties derived from the Sanitary and Highway Authorities whom the Rural District Council succeed. The latter group comprises new additional powers conferred on both Urban and Rural District Councils, and certain administrative functions transferred from Justices in Petty and Quarter Sessions. I. Rural District Councils. SANITARY POWERS. A Rural District Council from the appointed day become the successors of the Rural Sanitary Authority in the District and all the powers, duties, and liabilities of the superseded authority are transferred to the Rural District Council (s. 25 (1)). In other words the old Rural Sanitary Authorities are transformed into the new Rural District Councils, who will exercise all the powers and duties of the former authorities under the Public Health Acts and other statutes. Among the matters with which Rural District Councils deal under the Public Health Acts, are:-Sewerage and Drainage, Scavenging and Cleansing, Water Supply, Regulation of Cellar Dwellings and Lodging-houses, Nuisances, Diseased and Unwholesome Meat and Food, Infectious Diseases, and the provision of Hospitals and Cemeteries. They have also powers under various other Acts, e.g. :—' -The Allotments Acts, The Canal Boats Acts, The Housing of the Working Classes Acts, The Contagious Diseases (Animals) Acts, and the Sale of Food and Drugs Acts. Urban In addition to transferring to the Rural District Councils the powers Sanitary Powers. and duties of the superseded Rural Sanitary Authorities, the new Act Powers of an provides more effective machinery for conferring on the Rural District Authority. Councils powers which are ordinarily possessed by Urban Authorities only. Act, 1875. Section 276 of the Public Health Act, 1875' enables the Local Public Health Government Board, on the application of a Rural District Council or of persons rated to the poor, the assessment of whose hereditaments amounts at the least to one-tenth of the rateable value of the district or of any contributory place therein, by order to declare any provisions of the Act in force in urban districts to be in force in such rural district or contributory place, and to invest the District Council with all or any of the powers and duties of an urban authority under the Act. The order may be made unconditionally, or subject to any conditions as to the time, portion of the district, or manner during at and in which the powers and duties are to be exercised and attach, and when the application for the order is made by the ratepayers of any contributory place, the order is not to extend beyond the limits of the place. A "contributory place" under the Act is a Special Drainage District, and every parish or part of a parish in the rural district not comprised in the area of a Special Drainage District. Where a parish is partly in a Special Drainage District, the part without the district. forms a separate contributory place (s. 229). A Special Drainage District may be constituted of any portion of the area within the jurisdiction of a Rural District Council (s. 277). Among the powers of an urban authority under the Public Health Acts which can thus be conferred on a Rural District Council may be mentioned, powers with respect to Offensive Trades, Streets, New Buildings, Lighting, Public Pleasure Grounds, Hackney Carriages and Slaughter Houses. "Contributory place." Orders under section 276 of the Public Health Act, 1875, may be Other Acts. made to apply the provisions of certain other Acts to Rural Districts. Any provisions of the Public Health Acts Amendment Act, 1890 (53 & 54 Vict. c. 59) in force in urban districts only (s. 5), and the provisions of the Private Street Works Act, 1892 (55 & 56 Vict. c. 57), s. 4, may be thus extended to rural districts. The powers conferred on the Local Government Board by section 276 of the Act of 1875, or by any enactment applying that section, may now be exercised not only on the application mentioned in the section, but also on the application of a County Council, or with respect to any parish or part of a parish on the application of the Parish Council of that parish (Local Government Act, 1894, s. 25 (7)). 1 This Section is reprinted at page 325 of the Appendix. Application by K Sanitary Powers. Powers of an A further power is given to the Local Government Board to direct by general order that any of the powers, duties, and liabilities of Urban Authority Urban Sanitary Authorities under the Public Health Acts or any other Act shall be conferred on Rural District Councils, and that any provisions of those Acts relating to urban districts shall apply to rural districts (s. 25 (5)). Plans for Delegation to Transfer of powers of High An order under this provision may be made by the Local Government Board on their own initiative but it must be a "general order," that is, an order which at the time of issuing is directed to and affects more than one Rural District Council. It is the practice of the Local Government Board to describe a general order as such at the time of issuing it. The power to make such general orders is to be in addition to and not in substitution for the powers conferred on the Local Government Board by section 276 of the Public Health Act, 1875, or by any enactment applying that section; and every such general order made by the Local Government Board is to be forthwith laid before Parliament (s. 25 (6)). Where a Rural District Council have determined to adopt plans for the sewerage or water supply of any contributory place within the district, they must give notice thereof to the Parish Council of any parish for which the works are to be provided before any contract is entered into by them for the execution of the works (s. 16 (3). The Parish Council will thus have an opportunity of considering what the District Council are proposing to do; but the Act confers no power on them to interfere with the discretion of the Rural District Council in the performance of their duties with respect to sewerage or water supply. Any action that the Parish Council could take would be in the way of recommendation only. A Rural District Council may delegate to a Parish Council any power which may be delegated to a parochial committee under the Public Health Acts, and where the District Council appoint a parochial committee consisting partly of members of the District Council and partly of other persons, those other persons must, where there is a Parish Council, be selected from the members of the Parish Council (s. 15). It will be competent for the Rural District Council to appoint all the parish councillors members of the parochial committee in conjunction with members of the District Council. This provision has been treated of in connection with the powers of the Parish Council, see page 67. HIGHWAY POWERS. All the powers, duties, and liabilities of any Highway Authority way Authorities. in their district cease to exist, and are from the appointed day trans Highway Council becomes ferred to the Rural District Council. That Council become the successors of the Highway Authority, and also have as respects highways all the powers, duties, and liabilities of an Urban Sanitary successors of the Authority under sections 144 to 148 of the Public Health Act, 1875 Authority. Highway (38 & 39 Vict. c. 55), and those sections are to apply in the case of a rural district and of the council thereof in like manner as in the case of an urban district and an urban authority. But the Council Postponement. of any County may by order postpone within their county or any part of the county, the operation of this provision for a term not exceeding three years from the appointed day, or such further period as the Local Government Board may on the application of such Council allow (s. 25 (1) ). The Rural District Council succeed under this provision to any Highway Board or authority having the powers of a Highway Board, and where a parish separately maintained its own highways to the Surveyor or Surveyors of Highways or other officers performing similar duties (Local Government Act, 1888, s. 100). But they do not take over from a County Council the management of main roads, as a County Council are not included in the expression, "Highway Authority." Where the Rural Sanitary Authority have exercised the powers of a Highway Board under sections 4 and 5 of the Highways and Locomotives (Amendment) Act, 1878 (41 & 42 Vict. c. 77), the Rural District Council as successors to the Rural Sanitary Authority will continue to do so, and will have the additional powers and duties relating to highways of an urban authority conferred by section 25 (1) of the Local Government Act, 1894. Hd Surveyors of Main Roads. Powers under the Public Health The Rural District Council after the transfer has taken place will within their district, exclusively of any other person, execute the office Act, 1875. of and be Surveyor of Highways, and have, exercise, and be subject to all the powers, authorities, duties, and liabilities of Surveyors of Highways, and of the inhabitants in Vestry under the Highway Acts. All ministerial acts required by any Act of Parliament to be done by or to the Surveyor of Highways may be done by or to the surveyor of the Rural Authority, or by or to such other person as they may appoint (38 & 39 Vict. c. 55, s. 144). Under section 29 of the Highways Act 1835, the consent of four-fifths of the inhabitants of any parish contributing to the highway rate, at a meeting specially called for that purpose is necessary before the highway rate may exceed at any one time rod. in the pound, or 2s. 6d. in the pound in the whole in any one year, but this provision will not be applicable to a rate levied for highway expenses by a Rural District Council.-Dyson v. Greetland Local Board (13 Q. B. D. 946 ; 53 L. J., M. C., 106; 48 J. P. 596. Inhabitants of the District will not in respect of any property |