Nothing need be said about the functions performed by the Sheriffs and Auditors. The names of the offices sufficiently denote their duties. The Chamberlain is the treasurer of the Corporation. The Recorder, who is elected by the Court of Aldermen, is a judge of the Central Criminal Court, and chief judge of the Mayor's Court, which has an unlimited civil jurisdiction within the City limits. The Deputy-Recorder is called the Common Sergeant. He is elected by the Court of Common Council. So also is the judge of the City of London Court, a court which has the jurisdiction of an ordinary county court. The principle of elective judges is a bad one; but the elections made have, as a rule, done great credit to the electors. There have, however, been exceptions.

Among the other more important officers elected by the Court of Common Council are the Town-Clerk, the Remembrancer, and the City Coroner.

The City Corporation is subject to no external control or audit, and, except in the matters where the Metropolitan Board of Works has jurisdiction, it enjoys complete independence.

Most of the more important local authorities exercising jurisdiction in the Metropolis have now been adverted to; but there are many minor authorities which ought to be described in order to give anything like a complete account of London government.1 That, however, is outside the scope of a volume in this series.

1 Such, for instance, as the Thames Conservancy Board, the various burial boards, the City of Westminster, etc.

CHAPTER XI.

CENTRAL CONTROL.

Central Control-The Local Government Board-Its FunctionsAdvice-Administrative Control-Audit-Limits of Central

Control.

THE supervision of the Central Government over local authorities is mainly exercised through a new department called the Local Government Board. School boards and school-attendance committees, as regards all matters relating to education, are under the control of the Education Department of the Privy Council, while financially they are mainly under the Local Government Board. In matters relating to the contagious diseases of animals, the Privy Council is the central controlling department; and as regards loans for certain local purposes, the sanction of the Treasury is required. Licenses to local authorities under the Electric Lighting Act are under the control of the Board of Trade. But the general superintendence of local affairs is now gathered together in the hands of the Local Government Board.

Before 1871 it was otherwise. The exercise of central supervision was scattered over various departments, having no organised communication with each other. The natural result was confusion and uncertainty of action. The evil and its remedy are thus stated by the Royal Sanitary Commission of 1869. "However local," they say in their Report, "the administration of affairs, a central authority will nevertheless be always necessary in order to keep the local executive everywhere in action-to aid it when higher skill or information is needed, and to carry out numerous functions of central superintendence. The causes of the present inefficiency of the central sanitary authority are obvious.

"(1.) Its want of concentration-the reference of general questions of local government being made to the Local Government Act Department of the Home Office; that of measures 'for diseases prevention' to the Privy Council; and that of other matters to the Board of Trade.

"(2.) The want of central officers, there being, for instance, no staff whatever for constant, and a very small one for occasional, inspection.

"(3.) The want of constant and official communication between central and local officers throughout the kingdom. A new statute therefore should constitute and give adequate strength to one central authority. There should be one recognised and sufficiently powerful minister, not to centralise administration, but, on the contrary, to set local life in motion-a real motive power, and an authority to be referred to for guidance and assistance by all the sanitary authorities for local government throughout the country. Great is the vis inertiæ to be overcome; the repugnance to self-taxation; the practical distrust of science; and the number of persons interested in offending against sanitary laws, even amongst those who must constitute chiefly the local authorities to enforce them."

These recommendations were carried into effect by the Act of 1871.1 The Act recites that "it is expedient to concentrate in one department of the Government the supervision of the laws relating to public health, the relief of the poor, and local government." It then proceeds to constitute a Local Government Board, to consist of "a President to be appointed by her Majesty, and to hold office during the pleasure of her Majesty," and of the following ex officio members-that is to say, the Lord President of the Council, all the Secretaries of State, the Lord Privy Seal, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The ex officio members are unpaid. The President is salaried. Provision is made that the President and one of the secretaries to the Board may sit in Parliament, and as a fact the President has always been a Cabinet Minister. The whole Board, it is believed, hardly or never meet. Questions of national importance of course come before the Cabinet. The President and the Department do all the work. The Act seems to contemplate this, for it provides that the Local Government Board may adopt an official seal and style, and that any act to be done or instrument to be executed may be done or executed in the name of the Board by the President or by a Secretary or Assistant-secretary, authorised so to do by any general order of the Board.

The Act vested in the new Board (1) All the powers 1 The Local Government Board Act, 1871, 34 and 35 Vict. c. 70. Since then five or six Acts have been passed conferring additional powers and duties on the Board in special matters. See, e.g., the Local Taxation Returns Act, 1877; the District Auditors Act, 1879; and the Alkali Act, 1881.

and duties of the Poor Law Board; (2) All the powers and duties of the Privy Council relating to vaccination and the prevention of disease; (3) All the powers and duties of the Home Office in relation to public health, drainage and sanitary matters, baths and wash-houses, public and town improvements, artizans' and labourers' dwellings, local government, local returns, and local taxation.

The Board reports annually to Parliament, and also furnishes exhaustive returns of local taxation, expenditure, loans, and debts.

The functions of the Board may be considered under three heads-namely, advice, administrative control, and financial control. In order to perform these functions, the Board, in addition to the ordinary staff of a Government office, has attached to it a staff of medical men, architects, and engineers, to conduct local investigations of a scientific or technical nature. Its public health and medical department is under the guidance of a distinguished member of the Royal Society.1

In order that the Board may be able to offer efficient advice to the various local authorities who may consult it, it is essential that it should have the fullest information. It consequently has conferred on it large powers of demanding reports and returns of every sort and kind from local sources. Every year an immense stream of statistics is poured in to its various departments. Sir Charles Dilke, in reviewing its functions in a speech to his constituents, estimated the amount of statistical returns at its disposal at ten millions. It is the duty of the Board

1 Dr. Buchanan, F.R.S., a worthy successor to Mr. Simon, F.R.S., who has done so much for hygiene in England.