1903: 3 Edward 7 c.2: An Act to provide for the Authorisation of Races with Light Locomotives in Ireland.
[27th March 1903.]
BE it enacted by the King’s most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:
[Authorisation of races with light locomotives.]
1. — (1) The Council of any administrative county may, on the application of any persons or club, by order declare that any public roads within the county may be used for races with light locomotives during the whole or part of any days specified in the order, not exceeding three days in the year.
(2) The order shall contain such provisions as may be required by the Local Government Board for Ireland for the temporary suspension and regulation of other traffic for the safety of the public, for the restriction of speed in populous places, and for other purposes incident to the proper conduct of such races.
(3) Such public notice as may be required by the Local Government Board for Ireland shall be given of the provisions of the order.
(4) No provisions of any Act, byelaw, or regulation, restricting the speed of locomotives or imposing any penalty for furious driving, shall apply to any light locomotive, or the driver thereof, engaged in such races, save so far as the same may be incorporated with the order.
[Expenses of the county council.]
2. The expenses incurred by a county council in carrying any order under this Act into effect shall be defrayed by the applicants, and the county council may before granting the order require the applicants to make such deposit as may in their opinion be necessary to defray such expenses.
[Definition.]
3. In this Act the expression “light locomotives” shall have the same meaning as in the Locomotives on Highways Act, 1896, and all other expressions shall have the same meaning as in the Local Government (Ireland) Act, 1898.
[Extent and citation.]
4. — (1) This Act shall extend to Ireland only, and may be cited as the Light Locomotives (Ireland) Act, 1903.
(2) This Act shall only remain in force until the thirty-first day of December one thousand nine hundred and three.
Source: Law Reports: Public General Statutes vol. 41.
Hansard: Lords Second Reading; Lords Return.
Further reading: Wikipedia: 1903 Gordon Bennett cup.