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3-(2.) The ordinary day of election of borough councillors shall be the first day of November, or if that day is Sunday, then the following day.

Ordinary Day of Election of Councillors.-This sub-section follows sects. 52 and 230 (2), M. C. A., 1882. Where the mayor is one of the councillors who are to go out of office, a vacancy occurs in respect of his seat, although, as mayor, he continues in office until his successor has accepted office and subscribed the required declaration.

See sect. 15 (3), M. C. A., p. 13, ante, and note thereon.

3-(3.) The ordinary day of election of the mayor and aldermen shall be the ninth day of November, or if that day is Sunday, then the following day.

Ordinary Day of Election of Mayor and Aldermen.-This subsection follows sects. 61 (1) and 230 (2), M. C. A., 1882. As to the election of mayor, see p. 13, ante; and compare as to the election of aldermen, sect. 60 (1) of the M. C. A., 1882: see p. 17, ante.

3-(4.) The revised lists of voters in each borough shall in each year after the year one thousand nine hundred be printed and signed before the twentieth day of October, and come into operation as the register for the purpose of borough elections on the first day of November.

Register of Electors for First Elections of Councillors.-Sect. 27 (3) in similar terms enacts that an Order in Council shall provide for the revised register being printed and signed before the 20th October, 1900, so as to be ready for use on the 1st November: see the notes to that section, p. 176, post.

Register of Electors for Ordinary Elections of Councillors.- See the notes to sect. 4 (1), p. 49, post, as to the preparation of this register. It is to be noted that only the register for the purpose of borough elections will come into operation on the 1st November. The revised lists will not become the register for parliamentary, county council, or parochial purposes (i.e., for the elections of guardians) until the 1st January following: see hereon note to sect. 27 (2) p. 175, post.

Section 4.

POWERS OF BOROUGH COUNCILS.

4. Transfer to borough councils of powers from vestries and district boards.]—(1.) On the appointed day every elective vestry and district board in the county of London shall cease to exist, and, subject to the provisions of this Act and of any scheme made thereunder, their powers and duties, including those under any local Act, shall, as from the appointed day, be transferred to the council for the borough comprising the area within which those powers are exercised, and their property and liabilities shall be transferred to that council, and that council shall be their successors, and the clerk of the council shall be called the town clerk, and shall be the town clerk within the meaning of the Acts relating to the registration of electors.

Provided that in the case of borrowing powers so transferred, if the London County Council refuse their sanction, or do not within six months after application made give their sanction, to a loan, or attach conditions to their sanction, an appeal shall lie to the Local Government Board, whose decision shall be final.

Elective Vestry and District Board.-Sect. 34 of the Act (p. 205, post) defines an "elective vestry" to be any vestry elected under the M. M. A., 1855. It also defines an "administrative vestry" (i.e., a Sched. A. vestry), but does not define a "district board," which may be described as a body incorporated under the Act of 1855, constituted of representatives from a group of elective vestries in Sched. B. to that Act, and endowed with administrative powers under that Act and the Acts amending and extending the same.

Local Act: defined by sect. 34 of Act.

Borough Councils. For a list of the borough councils to be constituted under the Act, with the parishes comprised in each borough, see Sched. I. and Appendix B.

The Appointed Day is defined by sect. 33 (1) of the Act, p. 202, post.

Powers and Duties; Property and Liabilities.-For the meaning of these terms, see sect. 34 of the Act, and the incorporated definitions in the L. G. A., 1888, p. 206, post.

It is not possible within the compass of this volume to set forth at length the powers and duties of the vestries and district boards. But in a Table of Duties prepared at the instance of the L. C. C. for the information of the R. C. A. L. (Appendices to Report, App. IX. 327— 350), will be found a digest of the powers and duties of existing local authorities, set out relatively to those possessed by the county council, under classified heads. In the Introduction to this book a brief survey is made of municipal administration in the county of London. by the county council and the borough councils respectively.

Continuance in Office of Vestries, &c. until Appointed Day.-By sect. 27 (3) of the Act (p. 176, post), persons who were on the passing of the Act (13th July, 1899) members of elective vestries and district boards, will go out of office on the day on which the first borough councillors elected under this Act come into office, until which date they are to continue in office. As to the first elections, see sect. 3 (p. 46, ante). By sect. 33 (1) of the Act (p. 202, post), "the day on which the members of the borough councils first elected under this Act come into office" is the "appointed day"; but it may be such other day, not being six months earlier or later, as the Lord President of the Council may appoint, either generally or particularly, and different days may be appointed for different purposes, different provisions of the Act, and different boroughs.

Register of Electors: Town Clerk. For the purpose of forming the register of electors, the "town clerk" of every city and borough is, by sect. 10 of the R. A., 1843, as amended by sect. 7 (1) of the R. A., 1885, directed in April of every year to deliver to the overseers of every parish within the city or borough a precept containing directions for the compilation of the several lists, and thereupon it is the duty of the overseers to prepare the several lists of persons entitled to be registered as electors, from which lists, as revised by the revising barrister appointed for the purpose, the actual register is formed. By sect. 101, R. A., 1843, the words "town clerk," except in regard to the cities of London and West

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minster, and the borough of Southwark, extend to and mean any person executing the duties of town clerk, or if there be no such officer or person, then to such person as the returning officer may appoint for Sect. 56 defines the term to mean, in regard to the city of London, the secondaries, and in regard to the borough of Southwark, the high bailiff; and by sect. 12 (5) of the Redistribution of Seats Act, 1885, the high bailiff of Westminster was continued to be the "town clerk" for the three new boroughs comprised in the former parliamentary borough of Westminster. As regards the appointment of returning officers, the sheriff of the county is empowered by 2 & 3 Will. IV. c. 45, s. 11, 48 & 49 Vict. c. 23, s. 12, to appoint fit persons. The appointment is to be made under the hand of the sheriff in the month of March in each year; and the person appointed need not now be resident, but he must have an office within the borough. Accordingly, on the high bailiffs of Westminster and Southwark, and the returning officers of the other parliamentary boroughs within the county of London, has hitherto devolved the duty of issuing their precepts to "the overseers," and of compiling the registers of electors. But by sect. 4 (1) the town clerks of the borough councils are to be the town clerks within the meaning of the Acts relating to the registration of electors. And by sect. 11 (1) of the Lon. G. A., p. 103, post, they are to have the powers and duties and be subject to the liabilities of overseers with respect to the preparation of lists of voters in the borough. By sect. 27 (2), p. 175, post, an Order in Council may adapt the enactments relating to the registration of electors to the provisions of the Act with respect to the powers and duties of the town clerk and overseers, and may apply to London, so far as appears necessary, the law regulating the registration of electors in a municipal borough outside London. This Order will, no doubt, make such provision as will obviate the necessity, resulting apparently from the combined effect of these enactments, for the town clerk as "town clerk" within the meaning of the Registration Acts, to issue a precept upon himself as having the powers and duties and being subject to the liabilities of overseers with respect to the preparation of lists of voters.

The clerks of the county councils of Middlesex, Surrey and Kent, similarly issue their precepts to the overseers of parishes for the compilation of the lists of ownership voters within the parliamentary boroughs for their respective parliamentary counties, and these duties will, by sect. 11 (1) already referred to, be in future performed by the town clerk.

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Town Clerk.-The town clerk will be the successor to the "clerk to the vestry or "clerk to the district board" under the M. M. Acts. As to his appointment, see sect. 62, M. M. A., 1855. No person holding the office of treasurer, nor his partner, nor any person in his employ, can hold the office of clerk: sect. 63, M. M. A., 1855.

In addition to the town clerk being town clerk within the meaning of the Registration Acts, the town clerk will have, under sect. 11 (1), the powers and duties and be subject to the liabilities of overseers with respect to the preparation of lists of voters, and of jury lists in the borough, and any document required to be signed by overseers may be signed by the town clerk. See the notes to sect. 3 (4), p. 47, ante, and to sects. 11 (1) and 27 (2), pp. 103 and 176, post. As to clerk to the assessment committee, see sect. 13, p. 117, post.

As the successor to the "vestry clerk," he will, semble, be the returning officer at the elections of borough councillors. (See rules 1 and 32, V. A. E. O., 1898, applied by sect. 2 (5), Lon. G. A.) In provincial boroughs the mayor at ordinary elections fulfils that office: see sect. 53 M. C. A., 1882.

Reference should be made, as to the duties of a town clerk in a provincial borough, to sect. 17, M. C. A., 1882, and notes thereon in Arnold's Law of Municipal Corporations, 4th ed., 1894.

As to the nomination by Order in Council of a person to act as town clerk pro tem. for the first meetings of the borough councils, see sect. 27 (1) (c), p. 175, post.

Deputy Town Clerk.-As to the appointment of a deputy town clerk, see sect. 25, p. 173, post.

Borrowing Powers.-The purposes for which metropolitan borough councils are authorised to borrow are subject in some cases to the sanction of the L. C. C., in others to the consent of the L. G. B. I.—With the previous sanction in writing of the county council(a) Paving, lighting, drainage, &c.-Under sect. 183 of the M. M. A., 1855, for the purpose of defraying any expenses incurred in the execution of that Act.

(b) Street improvements.-The provisions of the above section
were extended to street improvements by sects. 72 and 100 of
the Metropolis Management Amendment Act, 1862.
(c) Mortuaries and hospitals.-Under sect. 105 (1) of the Public
Health (London) Act, 1891, for the provision of mortuaries

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