The Sun.
London, England, 1861-10-02 00:00:00

THE THAMES EMBANKMENT.

A correspondence has recently passed between
Mr. Cowper, the First Commissioner of Works and
Public Buildings, and Mr. Thwaites, Chairman of
the Metropolitan Board of Works, touching a claim
advanced by the latter body to initiate and carry
out the great engineering work of embanking the
Thames. At a previous interview Mr. Cowper had
stated to Mr. Thwaites that he byno means desired
to take the construction of the work out of the
hands of the Metropolitan Board, but that there
were many questions involved which rendered it
the duty of Government to legislate in the matter.
There were, for example, certain Crown rights,
which might involve controversies between diffe-
rent departments, and which admitted of more
facile adjustment by the Administration than by
any other parties. Again, that a private member
would experience much difficulty in carrying a
measure of such magnitude through the House of
Commons, which, unless promoted by themselves,
Ministers did not feel it incumbent on them to sup-
port. That, for these and other reasons, her Ma-
i jesty'sGovernment were of opinion that they should
take the necessary steps for complying with the
Standing Orders by preparing and depositing plans
and serving notices. Mr. Thwaites urged the claims
of his board to initiate as well as to carry out this
important work, there being no precedent for any
interference on the part of her Majesty's Govern-
ment in the case of a local operation, executed by
a local authority, and defrayed wholly by local
taxation ; although he felt sure the Board would
have no desire t 3 enter into any unseemly con-
troversy with the Government, but ho was most
anxious, while defending what they conceived
to be a public right, to do all within
their power, consistently with the dis-
charge of their duty to their constituents, to pro-
mote this great undertaking. Mr. Cowper explained
that the course it was intended to pursue was in no
way opposed to, or, in his opinion, calculated to
infringe, the Board's rights ; that he would prepare
a bill for carrying out the plan recommended in the
report of the Royal Commission, and would take all
the steps prescribed by the Standing Orders; that
the bill would empower the Board to execute the
works and authorise the Treasury to pay over to
them the fund in course of accumulation from the
coal dues, to defray the cost of the embankment ;
that powers would be given to the Board to open a
line of street from Blackfriars-bridgo to the Man-
sion-house, the cost of which he suggested might
be defrayed out of the 4d. dues, at present appli-
cable to improvements within the city of London.
That bill would, of course, be referred to a Select
Committee, and would be supported by the Govern-
ment in its passage through the house; after
which, should it succeed in obtaining legislative
sanction, the whole further conduct of the matter
would be confided to the Metropolitan Board of
Works, the Government having no desire to retain
any control or exercise any veto upon their acts,
Meapwhile, if they wished the insertion of clauses,
he was willing to receive `and consider whatever
suggestions they might be desirous of offering. Mr.
Thwaites referred to the amendment introduced
into the Coal and. Wine Duties Continuance Bill,
on the motion of Sir H. Willoughby, whereby the
new account was to be opened in the name of the
Treasury instead of the Metropolitan Board, and
requested an assurance that the Government in-
tended to make such provision in the new bill as
should insure the execution of the work to the
Board. Mr. Cowper, in reply, assured him
that the clear intentions of the Government were
to carry a measure giving fall powers to the
Board, and that on his part every effort would
be made in support of that intention ; but that
it would be impossible to say what it might
be necessary to do in the case of opposition to any
particular clauses. Mr. Thwaites reported, substan
tially in the above terms, the conversation between
Mr. Cowper and himself to the Metropolitan Board,
and then; on their authority, addressed a letter, on
the 10th of August, to the First Commissioner, in
which he stated thit "the Board, while anxious Ito
defend what they believe to be their- rights, weir°
too deeply impressed with the importance of the
subject and the difficulties surrounding it to wish
in any way to increase them by raising controver-
sial questions, and at once adopted the suggestion
I submitted to them, to suspend the instructions
they had already given the.engineer for the prepa-
ration of drawings and documents required to coin-
ply with the Standing Orders, feeling that, after
the assurance you had enabled me to convey to
them of the intention of her Majesty's Government
to assume all legislative responsibility, any present
action on their part would necessarily be either
antagonistic or superfluous."

To that communication C3wper replied
follows ' -

" Office of Works, Aug. 15.
" Sir,—l have to acknowledge the receipt of your-
letter of the 10th inst., informing me of the com-
munication you had made to the Board over which
you preside with respect to the views I had the
honour of expressing to you at our interview. Of
course those views are subject to modification when
the time comes for the preparation of the Bill anl{l,
for consulting other members of the Government as
to its provisions; but I think it right now to make
a few observations with a view of preventing miS-
understanding as to an expression which recurs in
your letter.

" You speak of your Board being anxious to
defend what they conceive to be their rights, and
as I am one of the last men who would wish to in-
fringe, even inadvertently, any of their rights, I am
anxious to ascertain what those rights can be.
" In considering whether the Metropolitan Board
of Works possess any:right to construct an embank-
ment of the Thames out of the funds accruing from
the coal duties, I am mot by the following circum-
stances;

" 1. The Metropolitan Board has no right or
authority, except that which it derives from the
Act of 1855 and subsequent Acts ; and the Act
which crnpowered it. to raise ratcsgave it no autho-
rity over the coal and wine duties.

;‘ 2. These duties are levied, not by them, but by
the corporation of London.

" 3. "These duties arc not received by them, but by
the corporation and. by ber Majesty's Treasury. /
" 4. The area over which the coal duties are
levied is larger than that which is represented by
the Metropolitan Board.

" 5. The application of these duties to metropoli-
tan improvements has• been intrusted to the corpo-
ration and to my predecessors in office.
"6. The foreshore and bed of the Thames are
under the, juri diction of the Board of Conservancy.
" As, therefore, 3-onr board has no w no power over
the coal and wine dutiep, and no power over the fore-
shore of the Thames except in regard to their espc-
ioilt bncinesq, the main drain:l:lT, I cannot understand
how the introduction of a bill to confer upon them
suck powers could be treated as an aggression upon
their rights. I do not see any force in the argument
that because such a work woad-have to be autho-
rised in a provincial town by a local Act, promoted
by local commissioners or by the corporation, a simi-
lar course should be followed in respect of the
metropolis.

" In every civilised country the metropolis re-
ceives aid, protection, and co-operation from the
national Government which is not extended to other
towns ; and I aun sure that Londoners cannot wish
that their town should in this respect cease to be
treated as a metropolis, and be reduced to the level
of a proviaciat town,

,g I am on prinelp!O an advocate for extending