National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949

47 Liability for repair of public paths

(1) Subject to the following provisions of this Part of this Act, the rule of law whereby a highway is repairable by the inhabitants at large shall apply to all public paths, whether coming into existence before or after the commencement of this Act, notwithstanding anything contained in any enactment passed or made before the commencement of this Act and notwithstanding any liability to repair of any other person; and accordingly the enactments relating to highways so repairable shall have effect in relation to all such public paths.

(2) Without prejudice to the generality of the last foregoing subsection—

(a) no order made under section twenty-one of the Highway Act, 1864, or section twenty-four of the Highways and Locomotives (Amendment) Act, 1878 (which sections provide for the making of orders for discontinuing the maintenance of unnecessary highways) shall have effect after the commencement of this Act as respects any public path; and

(b) after the commencement of this Act no proceedings shall be instituted under either of the said sections for an order relating to a public path.

(3) Where apart from this section any person would be under an obligation to repair a public path, whether under any enactment, or by reason of tenure, enclosure or prescription—

(a) the operation of subsection (1) of this section shall not release him from the obligation, but

(b) if in the performance of their duty under the said subsection (1) the highway authority repair the public path, they may recover from the said person the necessary expenses of so doing, and

(c) where the highway authority exercise a right of recovery under the last foregoing paragraph, then, if the said person would have been entitled to recover from some other person the whole or part of the expenses of repairing the path if he had repaired it himself, he shall be entitled to recover from that other person the whole or the like part, as the case may be, of the expenses recovered from him by the highway authority:

Provided that the right of recovery conferred by paragraph (b) of this subsection shall not be exercisable unless, before repairing the path, the highway authority have given notice to the said person that the path is in need of repair, specifying a reasonable time within which he may repair the path, and the said person has failed to repair the path within that time.