Tramways, Motor-buses, etc. 457 



system to electric traction ; while other companies applied 

 for powers to construct new lines or extensions of lines on the 

 same system. Parliament had certainly sanctioned a longer 

 period of tenure than twenty-one years when the promoters 

 could make an arrangement to this effect with the local 

 authorities concerned ; and it was hardly likely that a com- 

 pany would incur the great expense of constructing an entirely 

 new tramway, with electrical installation and other require- 

 ments all complete, unless they had some guarantee of a longer 

 tenure than the statutory period. But these very factors 

 enabled the local authorities concerned to control the situation ; 

 and their power to exercise this control was made still more 

 complete by the operation of Standing Order No. 22, which 

 applied to Private Bills for tramway schemes require- 

 ments similar to those of the Tramways Act as regards the 

 obligation on promoters to obtain the assents of local and road 

 authorities. 



These authorities had thus an absolute veto over any new 

 tramway schemes, and such veto might finally rest in the hands 

 of a single local authority, controlling a sparsely populated 

 section of the proposed mileage, yet having, perhaps, the 

 controlling voice in being the one authority whose approval 

 was needed to make up the requisite two-thirds. 



There had been some expectation on the part of tramway 

 promoters that the general position would be improved by the 

 Light Railways Act, 1896, many light railways being in- 

 distinguishable from tramways. Under this Act the assent 

 of the local and road authorities is not required, and the 

 frontagers' veto was done away with by it in the case of light 

 railways ; but authority to oppose was given to railway com- 

 panies, and in practice the Light Railway Commissioners 

 held that they ought not to authorise a tramway as a light 

 railway unless it connected the area of one local authority 

 with another. For these and other reasons the Act was not so 

 beneficial in regard to tramways as had been anticipated. 



In the case of tramway companies it became a matter either 

 of paying to the local authorities the " price " they asked for 

 their assent, or else seeing the schemes fail at the start, without 

 any chance of having them even considered on their merits. 

 How local authorities have used or abused the power of 

 control thus possessed by them is suggested by some remarks 



