Public Utilities Ordinance

Bill No. 179/1962

Read the first time on 27th June 1962.
An Ordinance to establish a corporation to be known as the Public Utilities Board and to provide for the transfer to the corporation of the functions, services, assets and liabilities of the City Council in respect of water, gas and electricity, and for matters incidental thereto, and to repeal the Electricity (Rural Area) Ordinance, 1951, and certain provisions of the Municipal Ordinance (Chapter 133 of the 1936 Edition) and of the Local Government Ordinance, 1957 (No. 24 of 1957).
Be it enacted by the Yang di-Pertuan Negara with the advice and consent of the Legislative Assembly of Singapore, as follows: —
PART I
PRELIMINARY
Short title and commencement
1.—(1)  This Ordinance may be cited as the Public Utilities Ordinance, 1962, and shall come into operation on such date as the Yang di-Pertuan Negara may by notification in the Gazette appoint.
(2)  The Yang di-Pertuan Negara may appoint different dates for the coming into operation of different provisions of this Ordinance.
Interpretation
2.  In this Ordinance —
“apparatus” means water, gas or electrical apparatus and includes all apparatus, machines, consuming devices and fittings in which pipes or conductors are used or of which they form a part;
“area of supply” means that area within which a licensee is authorised by his licence to supply energy;
“Board” means the Public Utilities Board established by section 3 of this Ordinance;
“Chairman” means the Chairman of the Board appointed under section 5 of this Ordinance and includes any temporary Chairman so appointed;
“City Council” means the City Council of Singapore originally incorporated by Indian Act No. 27 of 1857 and incorporated under and by virtue of the Municipal (Elections—Amendment) Ordinance, 1948 (Ord. 29 of 1948), with the status of a City conferred by Royal Charter dated the 24th day of July 1951, and as constituted under the provisions of section 6 of the Local Government Ordinance, 1957 (Ord. 24 of 1957);
“conductor” means an electrical conductor arranged to be electrically connected to a system;
“consumer” means a person who is supplied with water, gas or electrical energy or whose premises are for the time being connected for the purpose of a supply of water, gas or electrical energy with any system of supply;
“energy” means electrical energy when generated, transmitted, supplied or used for any purpose except the transmission of any communication or signal;
“General Manager” means the General Manager appointed under section 13 of this Ordinance and includes any acting General Manager so appointed;
“grievous hurt” and “hurt” have the same meanings as those respectively assigned to them in the Penal Code (Cap. 119);
“installation”, except for the purposes of Part V of this Ordinance, includes any plant or apparatus designed for the collection, production, supply or use, as the case may be, of water, gas or electricity;
“licence” means a licence issued under the provisions of section 46 of this Ordinance;
“licensee” means a person to whom a licence has been issued;
“live” or “alive” applied to a system or any part of a system, means that a voltage exists between any conductor and earth or between any two conductors in the system;
“main” means a pipe or supply line through which water, gas or electrical energy is or can be supplied, whether such pipe or line is in use or not;
“Municipal Provident Fund” means the Municipal Provident Fund established under the provisions of the Municipal Ordinance (Cap. 133 (1936 Edition)) and continued and deemed to have been established under the Local Government Ordinance, 1957 (Ord. 24 of 1957);
“occupier” means the person in occupation of the premises in respect of which the expression is used and includes the person having the charge, management or control thereof either on his own account or as agent of another person, but does not include a lodger;
“premises” includes messuages, houses, buildings, lands, tenements, easements and hereditaments of any tenure, whether open or enclosed, whether built on or not, whether public or private, and whether maintained or not under statutory authority;
“private safety” means the obviation of danger to individuals or to private property;
“public safety” means the obviation of danger to the general public, to public property and to roads, streets, railways, canals, docks, wharves, piers, bridges, gas-works, water works and their appurtenances and telegraphic, telephonic and other electrical signalling lines;
“street” includes any road, square, footway or passage, whether a thoroughfare or not, over which the public have a right of way, and also the way over any public bridge, and also includes any road, footway or passage, open court or open alley, used or intended to be used as a means of access to two or more holdings, whether the public have a right of way thereover or not; and all channels, drains, ditches and reserves at the side of any street shall be deemed to be part of such street;
“supply line” means a conductor or conductors or other means of conveying, transmitting or distributing energy, together with any casing, coating, covering, tube, pipe, insulator or post enclosing, surrounding or supporting the same or any part thereof, or any building or apparatus connected therewith for the purpose of transforming, conveying, transmitting or distributing energy;
“system” means an electrical system in which all the conductors and apparatus are electrically or magnetically connected.