Section 27 Provision for the maintenance of water-courses, drains, and similar works.C3C1C2

Where it appears to the Commission that any watercourse, drain, embankment, road, or other work has, prior to the sale of a holding, been cleansed or maintained in whole or in part by the landlord or at his expense for the benefit of the holding, either alone or in conjunction with other lands, and whether under the terms of the contract of tenancy or otherwise, the Judicial Commissioner may direct that there shall be deducted from the purchase money, and transferred and applied in manner hereinafter provided, a sum, whether in money, stock or bonds, which, in his opinion, will yield an income equivalent to the average annual expenditure incurred by the landlord in such cleansing or maintenance during the period of ten years preceding the date of the passing of this Act, as estimated by the Judicial Commissioner.

Every such sum shall be transferred to the Land Purchase Trustee for Northern Ireland, and may be invested or reinvested, and the income thereof shall be applied in or towards the cleansing or maintenance of the watercourse, drain, embankment, road, or other work in accordance with a scheme to be framed by the Commission after consultation with the Ministry of Finance for Northern Ireland, which scheme may, if thought fit, authorise the application of the principal sum or any part thereof, or the investments for the time being representing the same, in or towards the reconstruction or improvement of such work.

Sums so transferred to the Land Purchase Trustee under this section, and any sums which, prior to the passing of this Act, have been set apart as a fund for similar purposes in Northern Ireland, and the investment, reinvestment, and application of the same, and the execution and alteration of any scheme relating thereto, shall be deemed to be excluded from the general subject-matter of the Acts relating to land purchase in Northern Ireland within the meaning of the M1Government of Ireland Act 1920.