1. Short title.

An Act to amend the Law relating to Highways. (21st May 1885.)

WHEREAS it is expedient to amend certain provisions of the Highway Act, 1835, so far as such provisions relate to the cutting or pruning of hedges, and the powers and duties of highway boards in reference thereto :

Be it therefore enacted by the Queen'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. This Act may be cited as the Highway Act Amendment Act, 1885.

2. If in the opinion of any highway board a highway is prejudiced by the shade of any

hedges or by any trees or other things growing in or near such hedges or other fences, and the sun and wind are excluded from such highway to the damage thereof, or if in their opinion any obstruction is caused in any highway by any hedge or tree, or by any bank, or by anything growing on any bank adjoining such highway, it shall be lawful for such board at any time to cut, prune, or pare the said hedge, or to prune or lop the said trees, or to remove the said obstruction; provided that the consent of the owner and occupier of the premises on which the hedges, trees, or obstruction is situated has been first obtained.

3. This Act shall only extend to the counties of Wilts, Dorset, Somerset, Devon, and Cornwall.

Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, that is to say,

Section nine (relating to the publication of notices at post offices, telegraph offices, and public, municipal, and parochial offices);

Section twenty-seven (relating to objections to the lists of voters);

Section twenty-eight (relating to the duties and powers of revising barristers); and Section twenty-nine (relating to the power to fine overseers for neglect of duty), shall apply to the registration of ownership voters in parliamentary counties in like manner as to the registration of occupation voters; but save as aforesaid, nothing in this section shall be deemed to extend to ownership voters any of the provisions of the Parliamentary Registration Acts which relate to boroughs.

(3.) In the construction of the above-mentioned Acts and sections for the purposes of their application by this section, there shall be made the variations following, and such other variations as are necessary for carrying into effect the said application; that is to say,(a.) "Parliamentary county" shall be substituted for "parliamentary borough." (b.) "Clerk of the peace" shall, subject as in this Act mentioned, be substituted for "town clerk," save where the context requires a reference to the town clerk of a municipal borough.

(c.) Section nine of the Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, shall apply only to the publication of notices within parishes situate wholly or partly in an urban sanitary district and not in a parliamentary borough.

(d) Section sixteen of the Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, shall not apply to parliamentary counties, except so far as relates to the registration of persons entitled to vote in respect of a lodger qualification.

(e.) Section twenty-one of the Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, shall not apply to parliamentary counties. (f.) Any notice required to be given to the town clerk by section twenty-seven of the Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, relating to the withdrawal and revival of objections, shall be given in a parliamentary county to the overseers, and not to the clerk of the peace.

2.-(1.) For the purpose of the enactments relating to the registration of voters the lists of occupation voters in a parliamentary county shall be deemed to be part of the list of voters in that county, and any person whose name appears in the list of voters may object to the

3.--(1.) In both parliamentary counties and parliamentary boroughs notices of claims and objections shall be given on or before the twentieth day of August, and the twentieth day shall be substituted in the Parliamentary Registration Acts for the twenty-fifth day of August wherever the same occurs.

(2.) The overseers shall, in both parlia mentary counties and parliamentary boroughs, on or before the twenty-fifth day of August publish the lists of claims and objections, and deliver to the clerk of the peace and town clerk respectively the papers mentioned in sections nine and nineteen of the Parliamentary Registration Act, 1843; and the twenty-fifth day of August shall be substituted in the Parliamentary Registration Acts for the twenty-ninth day of August and for the first day of September whenever those dates respectively occur, and the first fourteen days after the said twenty-fifth day of August shall be substituted for the first fourteen days of September.

4.-(1.) The court for the revision of the lists of voters in a parliamentary county may be held within the same period within which a court may be held for the revision of the lists of voters in a parliamentary borough, and seven days notice of each court shall be sufficient.

(2.) All declarations made in pursuance of section ten of the County Voters Registration Act, 1865, shall be transmitted to the clerk of the peace on or before the twelfth day of September, and such declarations shall be open to inspection, and copies thereof shall be sold, on any day prior to the first day on which a court for the revision of the lists of voters in a parliamentary county can be held.

(3.) Where a place in a parliamentary county at which a revising barrister for such county is required to hold a court, is an urban sanitary district containing, according to the last published census for the time being, more than ten thousand inhabitants, the revising barrister shall hold at least one evening sitting of his court in such place, and section four of the Revising Barristers Act, 1873, shall apply to such sitting with the substitution of clerk of the peace for town clerk.

(4.) When it appears to the local authority having power to assign polling places in a parliamentary county that, for the convenience of the voters in some polling district in such county, it is expedient to direct the holding of a revision court in a town near such polling district, although outside the boundary of the said county, the said authority may direct the revising barrister for the county to hold a revision court in such town.

(5.) The revising barrister need not insert in any list of voters for a parish in a county or borough the names of persons claiming to be inserted in such list, but may revise the list of claimants in like manner as if it were a list of voters, and sign the same as so revised, and deliver it to the clerk of the peace or town clerk as the case requires, and such clerk shall insert in the proper place in the lists of voters the name of each person appearing from the revised list of claimants so signed to be entitled to vote.

(6.) The revising barrister shall, if practicable, complete the revision of the lists of voters for the parishes in one polling district in a parliamentary county, and transmit the same to the clerk of the peace of the county, before proceeding to revise the lists of voters for any parish in another polling district.

(7.) The clerk of the peace shall, as soon as possible, proceed to cause copies of such lists to be printed, and in numbering the names shall prefix the number one to the first name in each polling district, so that there may be a separate series of numbers for each polling district, and such distinctive letter shall be applied to each polling district as may be determined by the local authority creating the polling district, or in default of such determination by the clerk of the peace; and in the case of a poll such letter shall be deemed to be part of the number of the clector, to be marked in manner directed by the Ballot Act, 1872.

(8.) The clerk of the peace shall, as soon as possible after the receipt of all the revised lists of his county, cause to be made out and printed a separate supplemental list for each polling district, containing the names of all persons whose names do not appear in any list of voters for the parishes in such district, but who have been registered by the revising barrister as entitled to vote at the polling place of such district; and such supplemental list shall be placed at the end of the parish lists in each polling district; and the names therein shall be numbered consecutively after the rest of the lists in such polling district. The clerk of the peace shall add at the end of the register of voters a summary of the number of voters in each polling district.

(9.) Sub-section fourteen of section twenty.

eight of the Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, shall not apply to parliamentary counties, and in substitution for it the following provisions shall have effect:(a.) Where the name of a person appears to be entered more than once as a parliamentary voter on the lists of voters for the same parliamentary county, the revising barrister shall inquire whether such entries relate to the same person, and, on proof that such entries relate to the same person, shall retain one entry and erase the others.

(b.) The said person may select the entry to be retained by notice in writing delivered or sent by post to the revising barrister at or before the opening of the first court at which he revises any of the lists in which any of such entries appear, or by application made by such person or on his behalf at the time of the revision of the first of such lists.

(c.) If no selection is so made the entry to be retained shall be determined as follows:

(i.) if one only of the entries is on the
list of ownership voters, that entry
shall be retained; and

(ii.) if all or none of the entries are on
the list of ownership voters, and one
of the entries is the place of abode of
the voter, the entry in respect of the
place of abode shall be retained; and
(iii.) in any other case the entry in that

one of the lists which is first revised
by the revising barrister shall be
retained,

and if any such entry to be retained is objected to, the revising barrister shall not finally erase any other entry until the objection to the entry to be retained has been determined by him in favour of the voter.

5.-(1.) Where a person is entered more than once as a parliamentary voter on the lists of voters for the same parliamentary borough, and the revising barrister proceeds in pursuance of subsection fourteen of section twenty-eight of the Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, to retain one of such entries for voting, and places against the others a note to the effect that such person is not entitled to vote in respect of the qualification therein contained, and such person has not selected the entry to be retained, the entry to be retained shall be determined as follows: (a.) If one of the entries is on the list of freemen that entry shall be retained; (b.) If neither of the entries is on the list of freemen, and one of the entries is the place of abode of the voter, the entry in

respect of the place of abode shall be retained; and

(c.) In any other case the entry in that one of the lists which is first revised by the revising barrister shall be retained; and if any such entry to be retained is objected to, the revising barrister shall not finally place a note against any other entry until the objection to the entry to be retained has been determined by him in favour of the voter.

(2.) Where a parliamentary borough is divided into divisions, and notwithstanding the said provisions of the Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, and this Act, the name of a person is entered in the register of parliamentary voters in more than one division in the said parliamentary borough without such note as above in this section mentioned, and one of those entries is his place of abode, he shall be entitled to vote only in that division in which he is registered as a voter in respect of his place of abode, and shall not vote in respect of any other entry.

6.-(1.) Subject to the exception herein-after mentioned, where a parish is situate in a municipal borough and not in a parliamentary borough, the registration of occupation voters shall be conducted in manner provided by the Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, as applied by this Act, respecting the registration of occupation voters in a parish which is not situate in a municipal borough; and the enrolment of burgesses in the said municipal borough shall be conducted in manner provided by the Municipal Corporations Act, 1882, with respect to municipal boroughs to which the Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, does not apply; and revising assessors shall continue to be elected in accordance with the Municipal Corporations Act, 1882, as amended by any Act of the present session with respect to municipal elections.

(2.) But where any part of the area of the said municipal borough was immediately before the dissolution of this present Parliament included in the area of a parliamentary borough, and such parliamentary borough ceased after such dissolution to be a parliamentary borough, then the registration of occupation voters and the enrolment of burgesses in a parish in such municipal borough shall be conducted in like manner, so nearly as may be, as heretofore, and the Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878, shall apply to the said municipal borough in like manner as heretofore, subject nevertheless as follows: (a.) Parliamentary county shall, for the purpose of such application, be substituted for parliamentary borough."

(b.) The lists and register of voters shall be made out alphabetically in like manner as in the rest of the county, but the lists shall be framed in parts for polling districts and wards in such manner that the parts may be conveniently compiled or put together to serve as lists for polling districts or as ward lists.

(c.) The overseers of every parish in such municipal borough shall send to the clerk of the peace for the parliamentary county two copies of the lists of voters at the same time at which they send copies to the town clerk, and the lists of voters for a parish in such borough when revised shall be transmitted by the revising barrister to such clerk of the peace, and dealt with by him as with other lists in his county, but, save as aforesaid, the town clerk of the municipal borough shall, until such transmission, act as and be deemed to be the town clerk within the meaning of the Parliamentary Registration Acts and this Act in relation to such parish, and the clerk of the peace shall not act in relation to the registration of occupation voters in such parish.

(d.) The lists of occupation voters and burgesses shall be revised by the revising barrister for the parliamentary county in which the municipal borough is situate, and if that borough extends into more parliamentary counties than one, then by the revising barrister for the parliamentary county in which the greater part in extent of such municipal borough is situate, and such revising barrister shall hold a court in the municipal borough.

7.—(1.) Clerks of the peace and town clerks shall send their precepts to the overseers in the present year within twelve days after the passing of this Act, and in any subsequent year on or within seven days before the fifteenth day of April.

(2.) Where a parliamentary county is coextensive with or comprised in one county quarter sessional area, the clerk of the peace for that area shall, as regards such parliamentary county, be clerk of the peace for the county within the meaning of the Parliamentary Registration Acts and this Act, subject nevertheless to the provisions of section one hundred and one of the Parliamentary Registration Act, 1843, with respect to the town clerk of the borough of Newport, Isle of Wight, being deemed and taken to be clerk of the peace for the parliamentary county of the Isle of Wight.

(3.) Where a parliamentary county extends into more county quarter sessional areas than