PARLIAMENT AND LOCAL ELECTIONS ACT 1918.

CHAPTER XXII.

An Act to make further provision for the prolongation of the present Parliament, and the postponement of Local Elections. [30th July 1918.] BE it enacted by the King's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows :—

1. FURTHER PROLONGATION OF PRESENT PARLIAMENT. Subsection (1) of section one of the Parliament and Registration Act 1916 (5 & 6 Geo. 5, c. 100) shall have effect as if eight years were substituted therein for five years and eight months; and section one of the Parliament and Local Elections (No. 2) Act 1917 (7 & 8 Geo. 5, c. 13) is hereby repealed.

2. FURTHER POSTPONEMENT OF LOCAL ELECTIONS.-(1) The next statutory elections of county and borough councillors, district councillors, guardians, and parish councillors shall, subject to the limitations hereinafter contained, be postponed, or, in the case of elections already postponed under the Elections and Registration Act 1915 (5 & 6 Geo. 5, c. 76), the Parliament and Local Elections Act 1916 (6 & 7 Geo. 5, c. 44), the Parliament and Local Elections Act 1917, or the Parliament and Local Elections (No. 2) Act 1917 (7 & 8 Geo. 5, c. 50), further postponed, for a year; and the term of office of the existing councillors and guardians shall accordingly be extended, or further extended, by one year.

This provision shall apply only where the next statutory election (whether a postponed election or not) would take place before the first day of March nineteen hundred and nineteen in Great Britain, and before the fifteenth day of March nineteen hundred and nineteen in Ireland.

(2) Section two of the Elections and Registration Act 1915, and paragraphs (2) to (10) (inclusive) of the Schedule to the Parliament and Local Elections Act 1917, subject to the substitution in paragraph (7) of four years for three years as the period by which the term of office of an alderman of a municipal borough is extended, and except the provisions of paragraph (10) relating to the revision of jurors lists in Ireland, shall be deemed to be incorporated in this section as though they were set out therein, and expressly made applicable to the provisions thereof.

3. SHORT TITLE.-This Act may be cited as the Parliament and Local Elections Act 1918.

CHAPTER XXIII,

An Act to limit the right to a jury in certain civil cases, to raise the age for jury service, to amend the Law with respect to the preparation and publication of jury lists, and to enable coroners' inquests in certain cases to be held without a jury. [30th July 1918.]

CHAPTER XXIV.

An Act to enable Companies and other bodies to give Financial Assistance to Flax Companies. [30th July 1918.]

WHEREAS the extension of the cultivation of flax and the provision of increased supplies thereof is essential for various purposes of national importance, including purposes connected with the present war, and it is expedient that the giving of financial assistance to companies concerned in such cultivation and provision should be facilitated:

Be it therefore enacted by the King's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:

1. POWER FOR COMPANIES, &C., TO GIVE FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE TO FLAX COMPANIES AND TO BORROW FOR THAT PURPOSE.-Any company, association or body of persons, notwithstanding anything contained in any Act, Order or instrument, by or under which it is constituted or regulated, shall, subject to the consent of the

8 & 9 GEORGE 5, CHAPTER 24.

Board of Trade, have power, if so determined by a resolution passed at a general meeting of the company, association, or body of persons

(i) during the continuance of the present war, and a period of twelve months thereafter

(a) to subscribe for, take, purchase, or otherwise acquire, hold, sell, and dispose of shares, stock, or other securities of any limited liability company formed or to be formed, and having for its principal object the cultivation of flax or the provision of supplies thereof, or the promotion of such cultivation or provision;

(b) to lend money to any such company;

(c) to guarantee, or join with others in guaranteeing, any debts, obligations, or liabilities, present or future, of any such company;

(d) to give financial assistance in any other form to any such company; (e) to apply any of their funds or, with the consent of the Treasury, to borrow for the purpose of any such acquisition of shares, stock, or other securities, loan of money, guarantee, or financial assistance as aforesaid; Provided always that the power to borrow money conferred by this Act shall not operate so as to increase the total amount of money which such company, association, or body of persons is authorised to borrow; and (ii) after the expiration of the said period of twelve months to hold, sell, or dispose of any such shares, stock, or other securities, and continue or renew any such loan, guarantee, or other financial assistance, or any such borrowing as aforesaid.

2. SHORT TITLE.-This Act may be cited as the Flax Companies (Financial Assistance) Act 1918.

CHAPTER XXV.

An Act to make further provision for raising Money for the present War, and to amend the War Loan (Supplemental Provisions) Act 1915. [30th July 1918.]

Most Gracious Sovereign,

WE, Your Majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects, the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland in Parliament assembled, towards making good the supply which we have cheerfully granted to Your Majesty in this session of Parliament, have resolved to grant unto Your Majesty the sums hereinafter mentioned; and do therefore most humbly beseech Your Majesty that it may be enacted, and be it enacted by the King's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:

1. ISSUE OF NEW WAR LOAN.-(1) Any money required for the raising of any supply granted to His Majesty for the service of the year ending the thirty-first day of March nineteen hundred and nineteen, and, in addition, of a sum not exceeding two hundred and fifty million pounds, or for the raising of any sum required for cancelling securities or Treasury bills under the powers of this Act, may be raised in such manner as the Treasury think fit, and for that purpose they may create and issue any securities by means of which any public loan has been raised or may be raised, or such other securities bearing such rate of interest and subject to such conditions as to repayment, redemption, or otherwise, as they think fit.

(2) For the purpose of making the statutory provisions applicable to former war loans applicable to the war loan under this Act, subsections (2) and (3) of section one of the War Loan Act 1914 (4 & 5 Geo. 5, c. 60) and subsections (2) and (3) of section fourteen of the Finance Act 1914 (Session 2) (5 & 6 Geo. 5, c. 7) shall apply to any sums or loan raised or any securities issued under this Act as they apply to sums or loans raised or stock issued under the War Loan Act 1914; and subsections (3), (4), and (5) of section one of the War Loan Act 1915 (5 & 6 Geo. 5, c. 55) shall apply with respect to the issue of securities under this Act and to securities issued under this Act as they apply with respect to the issue of securities under that Act and to securities issued under that Act, and in those subsections as so applied any

WAR LOAN ACT 1918.

reference to war stock, war bonds, or securities issued under the War Loan Act 1914 shall be deemed to include a reference to securities issued under the War Loan Act 1915, section fifty-eight of the Finance Act 1916 (6 & 7 Geo. 5, c. 24), the War Loan Act 1916 (6 & 7 Geo. 5, c. 57), and the War Loan Act 1917 (7 & 8 Geo. 5, c. 41).

(3) There shall be paid to the Banks of England and Ireland respectively out of the Consolidated Fund or the growing produce thereof, for the management in every financial year of any securities issued under this Act, such sums as may be agreed upon between the Treasury and those banks respectively.

(4) Any expenses incurred in connection with the redemption of any securities issued under this Act shall be charged on and paid out of the Consolidated Fund or the growing produce thereof.

2. AMENDMENT OF WAR LOAN (SUPPLEMENTAL PROVISIONS) ACT 1915.(1) Regulations made under section one or section five of the War Loan (Supplemental Provisions) Act 1915 (5 & 6 Geo. 5, c. 93) (in this section referred to as "the said Act") may contain a provision directing that all or any of the provisions of the regulations shall, with such modifications as appear necessary or expedient, apply and be deemed always to have applied as respects stock or securities issued or money raised, as the case may be, before the date on which the regulations come into force, as they apply to stock or securities issued or money raised after that date.

(2) Section one of the said Act shall have effect, and shall be deemed always to bave bad effect, subject to the following modifications:

(a) The following shall be substituted for subsection (1) thereof:

"(1) The Treasury may provide for the establishment of a Post Office register (in this Act referred to as the 'register') and may direct that any stock or securities issued in connection with any loan raised for the purposes of the present war, and not inscribed or not registered in the names of individual holders in the books of the Bank of England or the Bank of Ireland, shall be inscribed or registered in the register"; (b) There shall be inserted after the word "stock" wherever it occurs the words "or securities";

(c) There shall be inserted after the word "inscribed" wherever it occurs the words "or registered."

(3) Sections two and four of the said Act shall have effect, and shall be deemed always to have had effect, as though there were inserted therein after the word "inscribed" the words "or any securities registered" and after the word "stock," where that word secondly occurs in each section, the words "or securities."

(4) Section five of the said Act shall have effect, and shall be deemed always to have had effect, as though there were inserted therein after the words "under the War Loan Act 1915," the words "or under any subsequent Act authorising the raising of any money for the purpose of the present war," and as though for the words "relating to deposits in savings banks" there were substituted the words "relating to the Post Office, to savings banks, to the Post Office register, or to any other matter under the administration of the Postmaster-General, or of any regulations made under any such Act."

(5) The said Act as amended by this Act shall extend to the Channel Islands and to the Isle of Man, and the Royal Courts of the Channel Islands shall register the same.

3. SHORT TITLE AND CITATION.-This Act may be cited as the War Loan Act 1918, and the War Loan Acts 1914 to 1917 and section one of this Act may be cited together as the War Loan Acts 1914 to 1918, and the War Loan (Supplemental Provisions) Act 1915 and section two of this Act may be cited together as the War Loan (Supplemental Provisions) Acts 1915 and 1918.

CHAPTER XXVI.

An Act to authorise an increase in the Amount of Land which may be acquired for the purposes of the Small Holding Colonies Act 1916, and otherwise to amend that Act.

[30th July 1918.]

8 & 9 GEORGE 5, CHAPTER 27.

CHAPTER XXVII.

An Act to grant Money for the purpose of certain Local Loans out of the Local Loans Fund, and for other purposes relating to Local Loans. [8th August 1918.]

BE it enacted by the King's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:

1. GRANTS FOR PUBLIC WORKS.-(1) For the purpose of local loans, there may be issued by the National Debt Commissioners the following sums, namely:(a) For the purpose of loans by the Public Works Loan Commissioners, any sum or sums not exceeding in the whole the sum of one million pounds;

(b) For the purpose of loans by the Commissioners of Public Works in Ireland, any sum or sums not exceeding in the whole the sum of two hundred and fifty thousand pounds.

(2) The sums so issued shall be issued during a period ending on the day on which a further Act granting money for the purposes of those loans comes into operation, and in accordance with the provisions of the National Debt and Local Loans Act 1887 (50 & 51 Vict. c. 16).

2. CERTAIN DEBTS NOT TO BE RECKONED AS ASSETS OF LOCAL LOANS FUND.— Whereas it is expedient that the principal of the several local loans specified in the tables contained in Part I., Part II., and Part III. respectively of the Schedule to this Act should, to the extent specified in the last column of those Tables, not be reckoned as assets of the local loans fund established under the National Debt and Local Loans Act 1887, and that the several sums specified in the second column of the Table contained in Part IV. of the said Schedule should not be reckoned as assets of the said fund:

Now, therefore, the principal of the said loans to the extent aforesaid and the said sums shall be written off from the assets of the local loans fund, and the provisions of section fifteen of the said Act shall, so far as applicable, apply thereto.

3. REMISSION OF ARREARS OF PRINCIPAL AND INTEREST IN RESPECT OF EYEMOUTH HARBOUR LOAN.-Whereas in pursuance of an agreement made in the year eighteen hundred and ninety-two the sum of ten thousand pounds was advanced by the Public Works Loan Commissioners to the Eyemouth Harbour Trustees on the security of the harbour revenues with the collateral security of the Fishery Board for Scotland:

And whereas by an arrangement confirmed by section three of the Public Works Loans Act 1901 (1 Edw. 7, c. 35) the liability of the Eyemouth Harbour Trustees in respect of the said loan was extinguished without prejudice to the liability of the Fishery Board for Scotland to repay the said loan, and, in consequence thereof, the said collateral security is the sole security for the repayment of the said loan:

And whereas the terms of the said collateral security are embodied in a memorandum of agreement between the Secretary for Scotland and the Public Works Loan Commissioners, dated the eleventh day of March eighteen hundred and ninetytwo, whereby a portion of the surplus herring brand fees, as defined in clause three of the said memorandum, was pledged in security for the repayment of the said loan with interest by the instalments and at the times mentioned in the security given by the Eyemouth Harbour Trustees for the said loan, and it was provided that the said portion of the surplus herring brand fees of any one year should only be applicable to the repayment of the one-fiftieth part of principal and interest on outstanding principal falling due under the security for the said loan in the same year, and should not be applicable to the repayment of arrears of principal:

And whereas the said portion of the surplus herring brand fees, so pledged as aforesaid, was in the year ending the thirty-first day of March nineteen hundred and eighteen insufficient to discharge in full the instalment of principal with interest which fell due under the security for the said loan in that year, and the principal sum of two hundred pounds, with interest amounting to one hundred and sixty-two pounds fourteen shillings and sixpence, now remains unpaid, and under the terms of the said memorandum of agreement is irrecoverable: