Statute Law Repeals - Law Commission - Ministry of Justice

PART 9
RAILWAYS
INTRODUCTION
9.1 A significant proportion of the statute book of the United Kingdom comprises
enactments relating to the railways. The great majority of these enactments were
passed in the mid to late 19 th century, the period that coincided with the spread of
the railway network across the United Kingdom.
9.2 Parliamentary sanction was necessary to provide the requisite powers to override
private and public rights, in particular to facilitate the compulsory purchase of the
land required by each railway. Legislation was also required to authorise the
raising of the necessary capital to finance individual railway projects. There being
no statutory procedure for incorporating new companies along the lines of the
modern Companies Act 1985, an Act of Parliament was needed to incorporate
each railway company. 1
9.3 Some 295 railway Acts are proposed for repeal in this part of the report. 220 of
them authorised railway projects that were subsequently abandoned. 41 contain
obsolete freight charging provisions. The remaining Acts are classified as
miscellaneous and include enactments passed to finance the construction of the
railway between Athlone and Galway in what is now the Republic of Ireland. In
some instances, under subsequent legislative powers, railway lines were
constructed on the same routes as the former abandoned projects. Our repeal
proposals do not affect the later powers.
9.4 The individuals and organisations consulted about these proposals are set out in
Appendix 3.
GROUP 1 – ABORTIVE RAILWAYS PROJECTS
Overview
9.5 These Acts are obsolete because the railway projects that they authorised failed
to materialise. In some cases the Acts authorised the commencement or
extension of a railway project that was subsequently abandoned. In other cases
the Acts authorised the formal abandonment of the project. The usual reason for
the abandonment was lack of finance. Large numbers of railway projects
collapsed in the banking crisis of 1866, a crisis partly brought about by ambitious
speculative investment in railway building.
1 Construction of a railway was also sometimes possible by means of a certificate granted
by the Board of Trade under the Railways Construction Facilities Act 1864 (27 & 28 Vict.
c.121) or under the Railway Companies’ Powers Act 1864 (27 & 28 Vict. c.120).
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