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Power to substitute new basis of charges.
Sect ext. 24/1924 0.12
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1.—(1) The Board of tRade may, on the application of any gas undertakers, by order, provide for the repeal of any enactments or other provisions requiring the undertakers to supply gas of any particular illuminating or calorific value, and for substituting power to charge for thermal units supplied in the form of gas.
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(2) An order under this section may provide for modifying the statutory or other provisions affecting the charges which may be made by the undertakers, by substituting for the standard or maximum price authorised under those provisions a standard or maximum price for each hundred thousand British thermal units (in this Act referred as “a them”).
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(3) The standard or maximum price per therm fixed by the order shall be a price corresponding as nearly as may be to that fixed by those provisions for each thousand cubic feet, but with such addition as appears to the Board reasonably required in order to meet the increases (if any) due to circumstances beyond the control of, or which could not reasonably have been avoided by, the undertakers, which have occurred since the thirtieth day of June nineteen hundred and fourteen in the costs and charges of and incidental to the production and supply of gas by the undertakers; and the order may make such modifications of any provisions whereby the rate of dividend payable by the undertakers or any other payment is dependent on the price of gas supplied as appear to the Board to be necessary:
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Provided that, if at any time it is shown to the satisfaction of the Board of Trade that the costs and charges of and incidental to the production and supply of gas have substantially altered from circumstances beyond the control of, or which could not reasonably have been avoided by the undertakers, the Board may, if they think fit, on the application of the undertakers or of the local authority, or, where the local authority are the undertakers, of twenty consumers, make an amending order correspondingly revising the powers of charging authorised by the original order.
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(4) An order under this section—
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(a) shall prescribe the time when and the manner in which the undertakers are to give notice of the calorific value of the gas which they intend to supply (in this Act referred to as the declared calorific value), and shall require that such notice shall at the same time be published in the London, or Edinburgh, or Dublin Gazette; and
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(b) shall require the undertakers, in the case of alteration in the declared calorific value, to take at their own expense such steps as may be necessary to alter, adjust, or replace the burners in consumers’ appliances in such manner as to secure that the gas can be burned with safety and efficiency, except in the case of any consumer who objects to such alteration, adjustment, or replacement by the undertakers; and
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(c) may prescribe, subject to such conditions as the Board may think necessary, the additional charge per therm which the undertakers may make in respect of gas supplied by means of prepayment meters; and
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(d) may make such supplemental and consequential provisions as appear necessary to give full effect to the order; and
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(e) shall come into operation on such date as may be fixed by the order; and
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(f) shall have effect as if enacted in this Act.
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(5) If within two years after the passing of this Act any undertakers have not applied to the Board of Trade for an order under this section, the Board of Trade may, after giving not less than three months’ notice to the undertakers, make an order applying to those undertakings, which shall have the same effect as an order made on the application of the undertakers.
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(6) Before making any order under this section, the Board of Trade shall, where the order is made on the application of undertakers, require the undertakers to give, and in any other case shall themselves give public notice in the London or Edinburgh or Dublin Gazette as the case may be and in such other manner as the Board may consider best adapted for informing persons affected, of the application for or proposal to make an order, and of the maximum or standard price per therm proposed, and as to the manner in which and time within which objections may be made, and shall consider any objection which may be duly made, and shall, where they think it expedient to do so, cause an inquiry to be held. The notice to be given under this section shall include notice to the local authority.
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(7) The calorific value of gas means, for the purposes of this Act, the number of British thermal units (gross) produced by the combustion of one cubic foot of the gas measured at sixty degrees Fahrenheit under a pressure of thirty inches of mercury and saturated with water vapour.
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