In 1921, faced with the prospect of a further large increase in the rates, Poplar Borough Council decided to hold them down by not collecting the precepts which it should have passed on to the four cross-London authorities.
The London County Council and Metropolitan Asylums Board responded by taking the matter to the High Court.
Eventually, after six weeks' imprisonment, the court ordered the councillors released, which occasioned great celebrations in Poplar.
The new Act also introduced a power, in clause 2, permitting a precepting authority to apply to the courts for the appointment of a receiver to take the funds directly from a council that withheld them.
[7] Despite the equalisation of rates, the dispute regarding the monies paid for outdoor relief would continue for some years until the abolition of the poor law unions.
Lansbury was hailed as a hero; in the 1922 general election he won the parliamentary seat of Bow and Bromley with a majority of nearly 7,000, and would hold it for the rest of his life, including his period as Leader of the Labour Party.
[5] In 1990, local artist Mark Francis painted a mural on the wall of the Tower Hamlets Parks Department depot on Hale Street, E14.