The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1851-07-29 00:00:00

369 n 3

X 1522 11 2

Your committee, immediately after their appointment, had
their attention drawn to the parochial assessments bill brought
into the House of Commons by Mr. Cornwall Lewis, and find-
ing its provision to work very serious injustice to the rate-
payers of Liverpool, be;ause of the expense and trouble which
would be cast upon them by the cumbrous machinery of the
measure, and in procuring the adjustibent of their rates and
assessments by magistrates for the county instead of as now,
Ly the borough magistrates on the spot, they memorialised the
house to exempt Liverpool from the operation of the bill, and
appointed a deputation to act in London for that end ; and
they are happy to add that the bill was eventually withdrawn.
During the past year your committee have had occasion to
bring under the notice of government instances which are still
occurring of overcrowding on the decks of steam vessels from
Ireland ; and the government, deeming further legislation
necessary to meet the evil, have laid before parliament a bill
having that object. As affecting the interests of the rate-
payers, the evil is one which, by permitting of a low rate of
passage money, sometimes only a few pence per head, frequently
induces large numbers of the destitute poor of Ireland to trans-
fer themselves to this parish. Crowding into the low lodging-
houses of the town, fever or other sickness is engendered, and,
sooner or later, they become burdens upon the poor-rates. The
Irish fever crisis of 1817, which was brought about by the same
means, cost the parish upwards of £70,000 previous to the
existence of this committee.

In the present session of Parliament your committee took
the necessary steps to procure the insertion in either of the
dock bills, promoted respectively by the Town Council and the
American Chamber of Commerce, the insertion of a clause
rendering contributory to the local burdens of the parish the
Liverpool Dock Estate. The application, however, was unsuc-
cessful, the Standing Orders Committee deciding that the rating
clause could be obtained only by means of a substantive bill.
Your committee likewise gave their best assistance to the
Town Council in the measure which they adopted to prevent
the alienation of the Dock Estate. They appointed a deputation
of their own body, which, with a deputation from the Guardian
Society, co-operated in London with the Town-clerk and the
deputation from the Council for the above object.
Your committee would now call attention to the course
which they have taken in reference to the claims made upon
the parish Parliamentary Water Committee.
Immediately after the special general vestry of the 20th June,
1850, that committee appear to have proceeded to incur very
serious liabilities, notwithstanding the divided state of public
opinion as to the object of their appointment, and the decided
opinion publicly pronounced by Mr. Lowndes on the above
occasion, viz., that the proceedings of that and the previous
vestry of the 7th of June were a nullity, and consequently that
no money could be legally paid to them (the Parish Parlia-
mentary Water Committee) out of the voluntary rate.
At their meeting, held on the 20th June, 1850, your commit-
tee received a communication from the secretary of the Parish
Parliamentary Water Committee, stating that a deputation ap-
pointed by the latter desired a conference with your committee
on the subject of the resolutions passed at the two Vestry meet-
ings before referred to. Such conference was accordingly held
on the 27th June, 1850, Messrs. Gage, Gream, Liversege, and
Dr. Collins representing the Parish Parliamentary Water Com-
mittee, and making formal application to your committee, in
virtue of the said resolutions, for payment of £3OO out of the
voluntary rate; whereupon Mr. Harbord, the chairman of
your committee, informed the deputation that, as legally
advised, the proceedings of the said special vestries, with the
polling which followed, were a nullity, and that the committee
could not pay anything out of the voluntary rate fund without
the consent of the contributors thereto.

Subsequently, your committee consulted Mr. Lownds as to
the proper course to pursue, in order to obtain the sense of the
contributors to the voluntary rate, in reference to the payment
of any money to the Parish Parliamentary Water Committee,
and finding that the concurrence of every contributor would he
necessary, and not merely a majority of them, they abandoned
the attempt as impracticable.
On the 16th October, 1850, your committee having received
from Mr. Gream a letter requesting, on behalf of the Parish
Parliamentary Water Committee, that the sum of .e5OO might
be paid into the hands of their bankers, Messrs. Moss and Co.,
they passed a resolution requesting to be furnished by that
committee with a full and detailed statement of the charges
which the payment was intended to defray ; and they appointed
a sub-committee to examine the statement when received, and
to report thereon.
In calling for these accounts, your committee had in view to
ascertain whether any part of the amount expended by the
parish Parliamentary Water Committee could be met by this
committee, seeing that two votes of the Vestry, to which appeal
had been made under their sanction, bad authorised that com-
mittee to take certain proceedings respecting the water bill.
On the 11th December, 1850, this Sub-committee received a
further letter from Mr. Gream, submitting a statement of
expenses, amounting to .42550, but not particularising the
items.
This statement, together with another received from Mr.
Gream on the 19th December, and one from Mr. Liversege on
the 27th December, were all successively rejected for the same
reason, viz., that they did not show the charges in detail.
At length, on the 17th March, 1851, your Committee received
through Mr. Gage another statement of account, amounting to
2,703 Is. 10d., and accompanied by vouchers to a certain
extent.
Having scrutinised the various items they found the large
sum of 41617 14s. 2d., which was not either verified by proper
vouchers, or which did not appear to them to be justified by
the resolutions so called of the 7th and 20th June, 1850; and
with respect to the payment of the remaining sum of £lOB5
7s. Bd., they decided to take the opinion of counsel on the
equitable view of the case; and inasmuch as Mr. Lowndes had
already expressed a decided opinion upon the subject, they
thought it advisable, in the present instance, to approach
counsel through some other channel. They thereby employed
Messrs. Fisher and Stone to draw up a case for the opinion of
some eminent barrister, whose opinion your committee did
not receive until the 16th of the present month, and which is
as follows :
" I am of opinion that a vestry has not any authority to
divert any part of the voluntary rate to purposes other than
those for which it was first laid in 1846.
"Ist. The committee was appointed to receive, manage, and
apply the voluntary rate for the purposes mentioned in the first
resolution, which was to form a fund for bringing into charge
all property within the parish, and for effecting an equitable
adjustment of the parochial burdens, and the committees ap
pointed in 1849 and 1850 were not appointed for any different
purpose,
' It, therefore, appears to me, that, notwithstanding the
voluntary rates of 1849 and 1850 were laid at the disposal of
the Equitable Rating Committee, it must be at their disposal
for the purposes for which the committee were appointed; and
that neither a geperaj poi spscjal vestry, nor the Committee,