Ratepayer against Taxpayer 149
non-county boroughs, the urban districts, and the
unions. Various expenses were even to appear twice
over in the accounts of the same body.
The Act, which does not here differ very much
from the government's first proposals, provided
that the poor-law unions should receive from the
counties and county-boroughs the 4s. a week for each
pauper lunatic, and several minor grants formerly
received direct from the national exchequer, and in
addition an amount equal to the salaries and allow-
ances of union officers and the cost of drugs and
medical appliances, not in the current or preceding
year, but for 1837-8. Urban districts {including non-
county boroughs) and rural districts were allowed to
claim from the counties half the salaries of medical
officers and inspectors of nuisances when the conditions
of their appointment were approved by the Local
Government Board. Lach non-county borough with
a separate police force, and consequently a police rate
of its own, could recover from the county half the cost
of pay and clothing. The highway boards disappeared,
main roads being made a county charge and the rest
thrown on the urban and rural districts, but urban
districts, including non-county boroughs, were allowed
to retain control of main roads within their districts
and to recover from the county the whole cost of
maintenance.
It would have been difficult to devise a more
atrocious jumble of finance. The whole of the
payments, except possibly that for main roads,
might much better have been made to the minor
authorities direct from the national exchequer, since
the passing of them through the county accounts
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