SCENERY LAW IN FRANCE AND ENGLAND.
pEOPLE who treat the disfigurement of public prospects as an inevitable evil when encountered on the daily round are apt to resent the eyesores as intolerable affronts when they are in quest of pleasure. This year the holiday makers will have recollections, more or less vague, of measures taken to give them relief, and will wonder why, in spite of the promise, they are still plagued. Many will think of the account pub- lished in July of the drastic legislation in the French Chamber by which field affiehes are to be taxed out of existence, and some, perhaps, recollect that when Captain Murray shortly after asked our own Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he would not follow the good example, Mr. Lloyd George declared that he was "in complete sympathy with the object that prompted the question." Others again will remember seeing paragraph after paragraph in the papers announcing that this or that English County Council had framed by-laws under the Advertisements Regulation Act of 1907 which forbid the "exhibition of any advertisement, visible from any highway" (including railways, rivers, build- ings, or footpaths), "and so placed as to disfigure the natural beauty of the landscape."
The enactments that have been noted are only the latest developments in a series that have been passed within the past seven years. In France the beginning is to be found in the Law of April 21st, 1906, "Providing for the protection of sites and natural ' monuments ' of artistic character." Under this Act Commissions are constituted for each Department, consisting of the Prefect, the Chief Engineer, the Head of the Forest and Water Departments, two members of the Council General, and five persona of distinction in art. science, and literature. The function of this Commission is to frame a list of "lands" the preservation of which may have a general interest from the artistic or picturesque point of view. This having been done, the owners are " invited " to enter into an engagement not to destroy or alter the condition or aspect of the scheduled spots without the special leave of the Commission and the sanction of the Minister of Fine Arts. Should the owner fail to accept the "invitation," the Prefect of the Department or the Mayor of the Commune is empowered to take measures for the expro- priation of any property designated by the Commission as proper to be scheduled.
So far the system is only an extension of the principle of our own Ancient Monuments Act and of the practice of the "National Trust." It includes natural objects "which have an aspect worthy of Le:ng preserved." It decentralizes control.
The " sitee " having thus been saved, the next step was to obtain legal powers for preventing defacement. These were readily granted by the Legislature. The law of April 20th, 1910, prohibits advertising on the lands and " historic " monuments scheduled under an earlier law of 1887, as well as on the natural monuments and artistic sites scheduled under the law of 1906. This provision would still have left the sites open to the risk of being spoilt by disfiguring notices in their vicinity. Accordingly a power was given to prohibit any advertising within a zone to be defined by a prefectural order.
A basis of principle was thus surely laid. But the scope of its application was narrow, and the process of " scheduling " was, by the nature of the case, slow. Meanwhile the larger evil called aloud for remedy. It was at this point that the Government and Legislature had recourse to the prompt and drastic method of taxation. The Statement of .Objects and
Reasons given by M. Klotz, the Minister of Finance, tells the whole story. "It is intolerable that entrepreneurs de pub- lieite should prevent promeneurs from enjoying the beauty of scenery. That beauty is part of the national patrimony."
"It appears that an immediate result may be reached by imposing on the advertisements in question a tax which would have in some sort a prohibitive character, tZad, as the injury done by the advertisements is proportionate to their size, the tax must be progressive." The scale varies from 50 francs a year per square metre for notices below six square metres in superficies to 400 francs per square metre for those above 20 square metres. The owner of the sites would share the re- sponsibility of the person erecting the notices, and is liable further to a special duty on his gains from this source.
It remains only to record that the Chamber of Deputies on the 8th July, and the Senate three days after, adopted the Government proposal unanimously and without discussion. On the 12th it was promulgated. The only modification was the postponement to July 1st, 1915, of its enforcement in the case of current contracts. But this exemption does not apply to advertisements on the scheduled sites.
It must be explained that the tax will fall only on advertise- ments exhibited at a distance of 100 metres from an inhabited place (agglomeration de maisons et de baltiments), and that advertisements on walls of houses or enclosures are exempt.
Although our neighbours have led the way in employing taxation as a means of repression, England may claim priority in the policy of regulation. After fourteen years of patient effort, the Scapa Society had the satisfaction of seeing the principle it advocated adopted, with general goodwill, in the Advertisements Regulation Act of 1907. This goes very far indeed beyond the limits to which French legislation is con- fined. It empowers local authorities to frame by-laws "for regulating, restricting, or preventing the exhibition of adver- tisements in such manner or by such means as to affeot injuriously the amenities of a public park or pleasure pro- menade or to disfigure the natural beauty of a landscape." It is only now that local authorities are showing a general disposition to avail themselves of the provisions of the law. The delay was not due to indifference. For several years the Home Office was naturally reluctant to sanction by-laws which followed the simple wording of the section. The method preferred, and indeed prescribed, by the Home Office was that of scheduling defined areas ; and no surprise need be felt that the Council, say, of such a county as Devonshire could not easily prepare a list of all the spots which should be saved from disfigurement. The three Lake Counties found a way out of the difficulty by scheduling parishes by the dozen ; but though this was approved at Whitehall, it was intimated that regions to which Nature was less prodigal in gifts most catalogue their treasures. Happily the Hants County Council was able to propose an arrangement which found favour with the Secretary of State. Their by-law ordains that "no advertisement shall be exhibited on any hoarding, stand, or other erection visible from any public highway (whether carriage way, bridle way, or foot way) and so placed as to disfigure the natural beauty of the landscape." The way being thus opened, other local authorities have followed the lead, the by-law in the later forms being improved by the insertion of words specifically including the view from railways, rivers, and publics places. The process of protection being once started, it will go on apace. It is worthy of note that famous pleasure resorts such as Scarborough and historic cities such as Exeter have been
able to schedule fairly extensive areas. Ft. E.
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