Land Drainage Act 1961

52 Interpretation

(1) In this Act—

• " the Act of 1930 " means the Land Drainage Act, 1930 ;

• " ditch " includes a culverted and a piped ditch but does not include a watercourse vested in or under the control of a drainage authority;

• " qualified authority ", in relation to an internal drainage district, means an authority in whose case an agreement made with the drainage board of the district under section twenty-five of this Act is in force.

(2) The persons who are qualified under any provision of this Act to make a petition or appeal in relation to an internal drainage district are the owners and occupiers of any land in the district in respect of which a drainage rate is levied ; and the number of qualified persons making such a petition or appeal shall be sufficient if, and not unless.—

(a) they are not less than forty; or

(b) they are not less than one-fifth of the number of persons who are qualified to make the petition or appeal; or

(c) the annual value for the purposes of the last drainage rate levied in the district of all the land in respect of which they are qualified persons is not less than one-fifth of the annual value of all the land in respect of which that rate was levied ;

but in relation to a district divided into sub-districts the persons qualified to make a petition under section twenty-six of this Act as being the owners or occupiers of land in one of the sub-districts shall also be sufficient in any case where the condition of paragraph (b) or paragraph (c) of this subsection would be satisfied if the sub-district were an internal drainage district. In relation to land assessed in accordance with subsection (4) of section twenty-two of this Act the references in paragraph (c) of this subsection to annual value shall be construed as referring to rateable value or net annual value, as the case may require.

(3) References in this Act to the execution or carrying out of drainage works include, except where the context otherwise requires, references to the improvement and maintenance of drainage works; and references in this Act to expenses of drainage works are references to expenses incurred in the construction, improvement or maintenance of drainage works.

(4) Subject to the foregoing provisions of this section, any expressions used in this Act and in the Act of 1930 have the same meanings in this Act as in that Act.

(5) References in this Act to any enactment are references thereto as amended or modified by or under any other enactment, including, except where the context otherwise requires, this Act.