Section 14 Power to acquire water rights

A local authority or a county council may, notwithstanding anything in section three hundred and twenty-seven or Section three hundred and thirty-two of the 38 & 39 Vict. c. 55.Public Health Act, 1875, but subject to the provisions of section fifty-two of that Act, be authorised to abstract water from any river, stream, or lake, or the feeders thereof, whether within or without the district of the local authority or the county, for the purpose of affording a water supply for houses provided or to be provided under a scheme made under the Housing Acts, and to do all such acts as may be necessary for affording a water supply to such houses, subject to a prior obligation of affording a sufficient supply of water to any houses or agricultural holdings or other premises that may be deprived thereof by reason of such abstraction, in like manner and subject to the like restrictions as they may be authorised to acquire land for the purposes of the scheme:

Provided that no local authority or county council shall be authorised under this section to abstract any water which any local authority, corporation, company, or person are empowered by Act of Parliament to impound, take or use for the purpose of supply within any area, or any water the abstraction of which would, in the opinion of the Local Government Board, injuriously affect the working or management of any canal or inland navigation.