This Act may be cited as the Local Authorities Empowering (Relief of Unemployment) Act, 1926.

Any local authority within the meaning of the Local Bodies’ Loans Act, 1913, may, without taking the steps described in sections eight to twelve of that Act, borrow such moneys as may be required for any public work undertaken, or proposed to be undertaken, by that local authority for the relief of unemployment.

The power conferred by the last preceding subsection may be exercised by any local authority pursuant to a resolution passed at a special meeting of that local authority and confirmed at a subsequent meeting (either ordinary or special) held not sooner than the tenth day after the day of such special meeting. Public notice of the place and date fixed for such subsequent meeting, and of the resolution proposed to be confirmed thereat, shall be given at least twice in the period intervening between the two meetings.

The Governor-General in Council shall not give his consent, as required by section twenty of the Finance Act, 1919, to the borrowing of any moneys under this Act unless he is satisfied that in undertaking the works for which such moneys are proposed to be borrowed the object of the local authority is primarily to provide employment for men who would otherwise be without employment or without sufficient employment to enable them to maintain themselves and their families in a reasonable condition of comfort.

Any sum paid by a local authority out of its general fund or account, whether before or after the passing of this Act, for the purposes of any public work undertaken for the relief of unemployment may be refunded to the general fund or account out of loan-moneys subsequently borrowed by the local authority pursuant to this Act for the purposes of that public work.

No moneys shall be borrowed under the authority of this Act after the thirtieth day of June, nineteen hundred and twenty-seven.