The Public Health (Scotland) Act 1897 in sec. 136 enacts-‘With respect to burghs subject to the provisions of the Burgh Police (Scotland) Act 1892, or having a local Act for police purposes, all charges and expenses incurred by or devolving on the local authority in executing this Act, . . and not recovered as hereinbefore provided, may be defrayed out of an assessment (in this Act referred to as the Public Health General Assessment) to be levied by the local authority along with but as a separate assessment from the assessment hereinafter mentioned-that is to say, the said assessment shall be assessed, levied, and recovered in like manner and under the like powers, but without any limit except as in the immediately succeeding section provided, as the General Improvement Rate under the Burgh Police (Scotland) Act 1892, or where there is no such rate, by a rate levied in like manner as the General Improvement Rate under the last-mentioned Act.’ . . And by section 137 it places a limit upon such Public Health General Assessment ‘which’ (assessment) ‘shall be imposed upon all lands and heritages within the district. . . ‘
The Burgh Police (Scotland) Act 1892 in section 359 enacts-‘Whenever the commissioners in any burgh shall resolve . . to make provision for the general improvement of the burgh, it shall be lawful for them to charge in equal proportions all owners and occupiers of lands or premises within such burgh, with reference to the said valuation roll and to all the provisions of this Act applicable to the Burgh General Assessment, . . with a special assessment . . over and above any other assessment or rate to which such persons may be liable under this Act, and such special assessment shall . . be called ‘the General Improvement Rate,’ and shall be leviable either from the owner or occupier of such lands or premises in equal proportions or in whole from the occupiers thereof, . . and such assessment, so far as the occupier is concerned, shall be recoverable in the same manner as the Burgh General Assessment is authorised to be recovered.’ And in section 373 (1) it enacts-‘No assessment authorised by this Act shall be imposed on any lands or premises exempt by Act of Parliament at the commencement of this Act from any corresponding assessment authorised to be imposed by the General Police Acts or the local police Acts respectively applicable to the burghs named in Schedule II of this Act annexed.’
Held (diss Lord Ashbourne – rev the judgment of the Second Division) (1) that the reference in the Public Health (Scotland) Act 1897 to the General Improvement Rate of the Burgh Police (Scotland) Act 1892 covered the exemption therefrom granted by section 373 (1) of the latter Act; (2) that a police rate imposed under a local Police Act upon occupiers only, used to a certain limited extent for improvement purposes, and being the only rate in the burgh so used, was a ‘corresponding assessment’ to the General Improvement Rate within the meaning of section 373 (1) of the Burgh Police (Scotland) Act 1892; and therefore (3) that where in a burgh named in Schedule II of the Burgh Police (Scotland) Act 1892, which had not adopted that Act, the port and harbour had been by statute exempt from such police rate, the port and harbour were also exempt from the Public Health General Assessment imposed under the Public Health (Scotland) Act 1897.
Judges:
Lord Chancellor (Halsbury) and Lords Ashbourne and Robertson
Citations:
[1905] UKHL 848, 42 SLR 848
Links:
Jurisdiction:
Scotland
Police
Updated: 26 April 2022; Ref: scu.621187