Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act 1878
| Jurisdiction | UK Non-devolved |
| Citation | 1878 c. 26 |
| Year | 1878 |
Parliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878
(41 & 42 Vict.) CHAPTER 26.
An Act to amend the Law relating to the Registration of Voters in Parliamentary Boroughs and the Enrolment of Burgesses in Municipal Boroughs, and relating to certain rights of voting and proceedings before and appeals from Revising Barristers.
[22d July 1878]
B E it enacted by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:
1 Short titles.
1. This Act may be cited as theParliamentary and Municipal Registration Act, 1878.
The Acts referred to in this Act by short titles may be cited for all purposes by those titles respectively.
2 Extent of Act.
2. This Act shall not extend to Scotland or Ireland.
3 Commencement of Act.
3. This Act shall come into operation on the first day of February one thousand eight hundred and seventy-nine, which date is in this Act referred to as the commencement of this Act.
4 Definitions.
4. In this Act—
The term ‘Reform Act, 1832,’ means the Act of the session of the second and third years of the reign of King William the Fourth, chapter forty-five, ‘to amend the representation of the people in England and Wales:’
The term ‘Municipal Corporation Acts’ means the Municipal Corporation Act, 1835, and the Acts amending the same:
The term ‘ Parliamentary Registration Act, 1843,’ means the Act of the session of the sixth and seventh years of the reign of Her present Majesty, chapter eighteen, ‘to amend the law for the registration of persons entitled to vote, and to define certain rights of voting and to regulate certain proceedings in the election of members to serve in Parliament for England and Wales:’
The term ‘Parliamentary Registration Acts’ means the Parliamentary Registration Act, 1843, and any enactment amending the same or otherwise relating to the registration of parliamentary electors:
The term ‘parliamentary borough’ means any borough, city, county of a city, county of a town, place, or combination of places returning a member or members to serve in Parliament, and not being a county at large, or riding, part, or division of a county at large:
The term ‘municipal borough’ means any place for the time being subject to the Municipal Corporation Acts:
The term ‘parliamentary voter’ means a person entitled to be registered as a voter and when registered to vote at the election of a member or members to serve in Parliament for a parliamentary borough:
The term ‘burgess’ has the same meaning as in the Municipal Corporation Acts:
The term ‘parish’ means a place for which a separate poor rate is or can be made, or for which a separate overseer is or can be appointed:
Other terms used in this Act have the same meaning as in the Parliamentary Registration Acts.
5 Explanation of terms. ‘House,’ &c. 2 & 3 W. 4. c. 45. s. 27.
5. In and for the purposes of the Reform Act, 1832, and the Municipal Corporation Acts the terms ‘house, warehouse, countinghouse shop, or other building,’ shall include any part of a house where that part is separately occupied for the purpose of any trade, business, or profession; and any such part may for the purpose of describing the qualification be described as ‘office,’‘chambers,’‘studio,’ or by any like term applicable to the case.
In and for the purposes of the Representation of the People Act, 1867, the term ‘dwelling-house’ shall include any part of a house where that part is separately occupied as a dwelling, and the term ‘lodgings’ shall include any apartments or place of residence, whether furnished or unfurnished, in a dwelling-house.
For the purposes of any of the Acts referred to in this section, where an occupier is entitled to the sole and exclusive use of any part of a house, that part shall not be deemed to be occupied otherwise than separately by reason only that the occupier is entitled to the joint use of some other part.
The interpretation contained in this section of ‘dwelling-house’ shall be in substitution for the interpretation thereof contained in section sixty-one of the Representation of the People Act, 1867, but not so as to affect any of the other provisions of the said Act relating to rating.
6 Additional lodgings.
(1)6.—(1.) Lodgings occupied by a person in any year or two successive years shall not be deemed to be different lodgings by reason only that in that year or in either of those years he has occupied some other rooms or place in addition to his original lodgings.
(2)Successive lodgings in the same house. (2.) For the purpose of qualifying a lodger to vote, the occupation in immediate succession of different lodgings of the requisite value in the same house shall have the same effect as continued occupation of the same lodgings.
(3)Joint occupation of lodgings. (3.) Where lodgings are jointly occupied by more than one lodger, and the clear yearly value of the lodgings if let unfurnished is of an amount which when divided by the number of the lodgers gives a sum of not less than ten pounds for each lodger, then each lodger, if otherwise qualified and subject to the conditions of the Representation of the People Act, 1867 , shall be entitled to be registered, and when registered to vote as a lodger, provided that not more than two persons being such joint lodgers shall be entitled to be registered in respect of such lodgings.
7 Period of qualification.
7. In every parliamentary borough and in every municipal borough every period of qualification for parliamentary voters and burgesses respectively which is now computed by reference to the last day of July, shall, instead of being so computed, be computed by reference to the fifteenth day of July.
The term ‘period of qualification’ in this section shall include any period of occupation, residence, possession, receipt of rents and profits, and non-receipt of parochial relief or other alms.
8 Forms relating to registration in parliamentary boroughs and burgess lists in certain municipal boroughs.
8. In every parliamentary borough and in every municipal borough the whole or part of the area whereof is co-extensive with or included in the area of a parliamentary borough, the forms in the schedule to this Act, or forms to the like effect, varied as circumstances require, shall be used for the purposes for which the same are applicable respectively, and shall for the purposes of the Parliamentary Registration Acts and this Act be deemed to be substituted for any corresponding forms in the schedules to the Parliamentary Registration Acts.
The said schedule and the notes thereto shall be construed and have effect as if enacted in the body of this Act.
All precepts, instructions, proceedings, notices, and lists relating to the registration of parliamentary voters or enrolment of burgesses shall be expressed in such manner and form as may be necessary to carry the provisions of this Act into effect.
9 Publication of notices and lists in post and telegraph offices, &c.
9. In every parliamentary borough and in every municipal borough the whole or part of the area whereof is co-extensive with or included in the area of a parliamentary borough, any notice or list which is by the Parliamentary Registration Acts or this Act directed to be published by overseers shall be published by them not only in the manner directed by those Acts, but also by being affixed and kept in some public and conspicuous position in or near every post office and telegraph office occupied by or on behalf of Her Majesty's Postmaster General, and in or near every public or municipal or parochial office within the parish to which the list relates.
All the provisions of those Acts with respect to the publication of notices or lists shall apply to the publication to be made under this section.
10 Notice of rates in arrear.
10. Where the whole or part of the area of a municipal borough is co-extensive with or included in the area of a parliamentary borough, section eleven of the Parliamentary Registration Act, 1843, and section twenty-eight of the Representation of the People Act, 1867, (which relate to the notices to be published and given with respect to rates and taxes in arrear,) shall, as amended by this Act, extend with the necessary modifications to the rates of which the payment is required as a condition of enrolment on the burgess roll, and all the provisions of those sections as so amended shall apply to the overseers of parishes situate wholly or partly in a municipal borough accordingly.
Any notice required to be given under this section shall be deemed to be duly given if delivered to the occupier or left at his last or usual place of abode, or with some person on the premises in respect of which the rate is payable.
In case no such person can be found, then the notice required to be given under this section or under section twenty-eight of the Representation of the People Act, 1867, shall be deemed to be duly given if affixed upon some conspicuous part of the premises.
Any overseer who with intent to keep an occupier off the list or register of voters for a parliamentary borough, or off the burgess lists or burgess roll of a municipal borough, shall wilfully withhold any notice required by this section to be given to such occupier, shall be deemed guilty of a breach of duty in the execution of this Act.
Section twenty-nine of the Representation of the People Act, 1867, shall extend and be applicable to every...
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