This Act may be cited as the Hutt River Board Empowering Act 1957.

In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires,—

Notwithstanding anything in section nine of the River Boards Amendment Act 1913, and in addition to the powers thereby conferred, the Board may in any year make and levy any rate which the Board is authorised to make and levy on a scale which may be uniform in respect of the rateable property on which that rate may be made and levied:

Provided that where any general rate which the Board is authorised to make and levy by section eighty-seven of the River Boards Act 1908 is made and levied on a uniform scale under this section, the maximum rate that may be made and levied pursuant to this section shall not exceed one-eighth of a penny in the pound on the capital value of all rateable property in the district, or its equivalent on the unimproved value or annual value:

Provided also that where any special loan is to be raised by the Board for any authorised purpose for the benefit of part of the district, any special rate made and levied under this section as security for that loan shall be made and levied on the rateable property in that part only.

The Board shall within six months after the passing of this Act request the Local Government Commission to consider whether any portion of the Mangaroa Riding of the County of Hutt now included in the Hutt River District should be excluded therefrom.

If the Board fails to make such request within the said period of six months, this section shall cease to be in force on the thirty-first day of March, nineteen hundred and fifty-nine.

All rates made and levied by the Board on a uniform scale for the years that ended with the thirty-first day of March, nineteen hundred and fifty-five, the thirty-first day of March, nineteen hundred and fifty-six, and the thirty-first day of March, nineteen hundred and fifty-seven, and for the year ending with the thirty-first day of March, nineteen hundred and fifty-eight, are hereby declared to have been validly made and levied.

Notwithstanding the provisions of section forty-eight A of the River Boards Act 1908, as inserted by section thirty of the Statutes Amendment Act 1950, the annual allowance that may be paid to the Chairman of the Board pursuant to that section shall be such sum, not exceeding one hundred and fifty pounds, as the Board fixes from time to time.