Folios 311-314. To: Home Secretary. From: Robert Sutcliffe, Idle, [Yorkshire]. A letter and a petition. …

Description: Folios 311-314. To: Home Secretary. From: Robert Sutcliffe, Idle, [Yorkshire]. A letter and a petition. Sutcliffe forwards the petition, signed by him and 14 other Idle freeholders. The petition requests that the Home Secretary will not grant the petition of members of the Idle Local Board to remit surcharges made against them by the auditor of their accounts for disallowed payments made in connection to the Idle Local Board's attempts to block the supply of water to Idle by the Bradford Corporation and their affiliated water company, and instead to obtain a water supply from within the Idle District. The petitioners say the Idle District is influence by powerful stone mining interests, whose mines are plagued by water. These mine owners would therefore be much pleased if the water were raised out of their mines by the District for free. It is for this reason the Idle Local Board have been attempting to ensure Idle is supplied with water from theses sources, the petitioners say, even though the 'water is polluted by the excrete of the many hundreds of men who are continually at work in the said stone mines'. Nevertheless the Idle Local Board have continually laboured to try and bring this flawed scheme to fruition, 'wasting' much of the 'ratepayers' money' in the process. For this reason the petitioners request that the Home Secretary will allow the surcharges to stand.

Date: 17/10/1866

Last import: September 11, 2017