, for a proposal for
all or any of the things hereafter mentioned, they may hold a local
inquiry after giving such notice in the locality and to such public
departments as may be prescribed from time to time by the orders of
the Local Government Board. The things referred to include the
alteration of the boundary of the district or parish; the division or
union thereof with any other district or districts, parish or
parishes; the conversion of a rural district or part thereof into an
urban district or vice versa. In these cases, after the local inquiry
above referred to has been held, the county council, being satisfied
that the proposal is desirable, may make an order for the same
accordingly. The order has to be submitted to the Local Government
Board, and that board must hold a local inquiry in order to determine
whether the order should be confirmed or not, if the council of any
district affected by it, or one-sixth of the total number of electors
in the district or parish to which it relates, petition against it.
The Local Government Board have power to modify the terms of the order
whether it is petitioned against or not, but if there is no petition,
they are bound to confirm, subject only to such modifications. Very
large powers are conferred upon county councils for the purpose of
giving full effect to orders made by them under these provisions. A
considerable extension of the same powers was made by the Local
Government Act 1894, which practically required every council to take
into consideration the areas of sanitary districts and parishes within
the entire administrative county, and to see that a parish did not
extend into more than one sanitary district; to provide for the
division of a district which did extend into more than one district
into separate parishes, so that for the future the parish should not
be in more than one county district; and to provide for every parish
and rural sanitary district being within one county. An enormous
number of orders under the act of 1894 was made by county councils,
and, speaking generally, it will now be found that no parish extends
into more than one county or county district. Other powers and duties
of the county council under the act of 1894 will be noticed hereafter.

Of the statutes affecting county councils passed subsequent to 1888
mention need only be made of the chief.

Education.

P