—whose speech was interrupted at half past Five on Wednesday—said the Amendment was more than an appeal for relief of taxation on behalf of a deserving class—the class of small traders, on whom the burden of local and Imperial taxation fell with exceptional weight. It was the expression of a principle which it was desirable to intro duce into the procedure of the collection of the Income Tax—namely, that those who received and enjoyed incomes should be themselves directly taxed for income purposes, and that those who under the existing law did not enjoy the income should not be called upon to pay the tax. That principle seemed so just that it was hardly necessary to insist upon it. When the Income Tax Act of 1842 was passed, a husband could appropriate the income which his wife earned; but under the Married Women's Property Act the wife had now the full enjoyment of her own earnings. It appeared to him that the Act of 1842 became iniquitous after the passing of the Married Women's Property Act, for while the wife enjoyed her own income the husband had to pay the tax on that income which he did not himself receive. The present First Lord of the Treasury, speaking in Committee on the Finance Act of 1894, when this very question was under discussion, stated that the plan adopted by the Treasury in regard to the joint income of husband and wife was unjust and absurd, and that the joint incomes of husband and wife should always be separated. That criticism had such an effect on the then Chancellor of the Exchequer—the right hon. Member for Monmouthshire—that on report he inserted an Amendment which went in some way towards relieving the grievance complained of. But it did not go far enough. It met the case of wives who derived their incomes from professional sources, but not the case of wives whose incomes were derived from industrial pursuits. Many men who were constantly away from home or followed dangerous occupations, put their wives into small shops from which small incomes were derived, as a security in the event of their death. Take the case of a man's salary about £3 a week and the wife's profit, derived from the shop, £1 per week, and on the two sums taken together, the husband would have to pay income tax on £48. The tax might be small in such a case, but when the income was small the burden even of a few shillings was great. He could see no reason why wives managing small shops in that way should be denied the relief which was given to wives with incomes from professional sources. He hoped the Chancellor of the Exchequer would be able on report to make this small concession which would be valued by a very deserving class.

said the Chancellor of the Exchequer was good enough to regret his absence yesterday when this Amendment was proposed. He, too, was sorry he was not present; but he rose now to express his entire concurrence with the arguments by which the right hon. Gentleman bad resisted the Amendment. The question was discussed at great length on the Finance Act of 1894, on an Amendment moved by the hon. member for North Islington, and he agreed to give the relief asked for in cases where the income of the wife was derived from professional sources. But, evidently, the member for North Islington was not easily satisfied—[laughter]—or perhaps it was that gratitude was not a political virtue. [Laughter.] The hon. Member and his friends were asking for more, and he earnestly hoped the Chancellor of the Exchequer would not give them what they wanted. He had no hesitation in saying that, if the Amendment were adopted, a most serious blow—he was going to say a fatal blow—would be struck at the revenue from Income Tax. It was true that the present First Lord of the Treasury, during the discussion of the Amendment to the Finance Act of 1894, stated that the incomes of the husband and wife should always be treated separately. That was all very well for the right hon. Gentleman: he was only harrying a Liberal Chancellor of the Exchequer. [Laughter.] Now he desired to rescue a Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer from the doctrines of the First Lord of the Treasury. [Laughter.] The case of a locomotive driver, whose wife carried on a small shop, had been quoted But there was no limitation in the proposal of the Amendment to industrial pursuits. It applied to all cases of joint incomes of husband and wife. Take the case of a man with a salary of £300 a year who had the fortune to marry a wife with a nice little competence of £200 a year. That was £500 a year between them, and they would obtain the exemption, while another man who had a hard-earned income of £500, and married a wife with no money, was to get no relief at all. ["Hear, hear!"] Which was the harder ease? These claims were put forward by people who had not sufficiently considered the question, and it was necessary to be most careful in acceding to them. He went as far as he could in 1894, and at that time the whole Tory Party maintained the doctrines which the Chancellor of the Exchequer now wisely resisted. The right hon. Gentleman had been asked to pledge himself to do something on Report, but he hoped he would do nothing of the kind—["hear, hear!"]—in spite of the hon. Member for Islington and the hon. Member for West Ham; and he should take this precious opportunity of supporting the Government when it was in the right. [Laughter.] He begged Gentlemen on the Opposition side of the House not to be led away by the sort of argument which had been used, because it was a blow at the principle of direct taxation. They had been labouring with difficulty for years to reach an equilibrium between direct and indirect taxation; and all these exemptions were in the direction of weakening and diluting direct taxation. ["Hear, hear!"]

said that the solicitude of the ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer for the prosperity of his successor was quite touching. When this question was raised in 1894 the right hon. Gentleman said he could not afford to be logical. Events had shown that the right hon. Gentleman was mistaken in that respect, and probably he regretted by this time that his surplus had not been applied to other purposes than to some of those to which it had been actually appropriated. The right hon. Gentleman based his argument on the assumption that all husbands and wives had a joint purse. Unfortunately all married people did not live together, and even when they did, the wives availed themselves of the Married Women's Property Act, and took care to have the expenditure of their own money. The right hon. Gentleman was anxious to diminish public expenditure; but one way of doing that was to diminish the supply. When financial reformers had desired the abolition of a tax, they had not waited till the Chancellor of the Exchequer said that he could afford it. They insisted on abolition, and when the country had made up its mind, the Chancellor of the Exchequer abolished the tax, and found other means of meeting the deficiency, either by new taxation or diminished expenditure,

said that he should not ask the House to divide, because he was quite satisfied with the Chancellor of the Exchequer's declaration that he would endeavour to meet the case another year. He only desired to see all married women treated on the same lines.

I hope the hon. Member does not misunderstand me. I confined my remarks solely to industrial incomes.

Certainly.

called attention to the collection of Income Tax in regard to works, factories, etc. For many years different associations of employers had been representing to the Commissioners the grievance as to the allowance for depreciation not only on buildings, but also on machinery. The Commissioners at Somerset House had received the representations with great courtesy, but no advance towards redress had been made in the last 20 years. The present rule was applicable to the state of things 30 years ago. The conditions had now quite changed, and in consequence of the high speeds at which machinery was now driven its life was considerably shorter than it used to be. He asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer to consider this matter, and he hoped the right hon. Gentleman would see his way to make some alteration. Another important matter was that any individual who was the owner of works got a false idea as to the value of them. He died, and the property was left to his family, who again had a false idea as to their value, and consequently were led to spend an income beyond their means.

The hon. Member is raising a question of assessment which does not strictly arise on this clause.

said that if the hon. Member would furnish him with particulars he would look into the question.

mentioned the hard case of a man who had earned an income paying the same amount of taxation as the man who got his income from capital. The man who earned £1,500 a year had to pay the same Income Tax as the man who had £50,000 invested in Three Per Cents., and who, dying, left his money to his wife and family. He hoped that the Chancellor of the Exchequer in a future Budget would pay some attention to this matter.

objected to the principle of differentiation contained in the clause as unfair. On Schedules A, C, D, and E the Income Tax payer had to pay the full 20s., but on Schedule B he had only to pay one-third. It was unfair that this differentiation should be made in favour of one class of the community.

said that one of the great difficulties farmers had in claiming exemption was a difficulty of keeping a form of accounts which would present their case definitely, so as to show those who had to judge whether exemption should be allowed. Would it not be possible for the Chancellor of the Exchequer in conjunction with the President of the Board of Agriculture to issue a simple and easy form of accounts to enable farmers to claim the exemption offered in this clause?

believed that at present, on application at the office of the Surveyor of Income Tax, farmers could obtain forms of accounts setting forth the items of profit and loss on the farm. He would, however, look into the matter.

Any difference as between one part of a parish and another is illegal.

pointed out that in some parishes there was separate tithings.

said that for Land Tax purposes each tithing, if it had a separate quota, was a separate parish.

maintained that he was right in saying that the Land Tax was levied at different rates in the same parish. The next question was in regard to the redeemed and unredeemed Land Tax. The Government proposed to deal only with the unredeemed Land Tax. He could not see why if this gift to the landlords was made it should not be given to those who had redeemed the tax. He had always understood that the Crown did not absolutely sell the tax, but that the Consols in respect of the tax were earmarked in the name of the owner, the object being to leave the Government open at any time to reconsider the matter. It seemed to him that there was a great deal of unfairness in the proposal of the Government. Take the case of a parish where the quota was £100, and say that half that quota had been redeemed, and that it was necessary for the remaining quota to raise 2s. in the pound. Under the proposal of the Government the man who had not redeemed his Land Tax would receive 1s. in the pound, and his Land Tax contribution would be greatly reduced, while the man who had redeemed would get no benefit. There was no difficulty in tracing the owner of the redeemed Land Tax. Every year when the Land Tax valuation was made the redeemed Land Tax would have to be taken into consideration, so that there would be no difficulty in dealing with the matter from that point of view. He could not see any strong arguments in favour of the Treasury giving up all the Land Tax above the amount of 1s. in the pound. It could not be on the ground that it was a heavy or oppressive tax, because the Chancellor of the Exchequer had told them that the amount that would be remitted would not be more than £100,000 altogether, if it amounted to so much. Of course, it might be argued that it was a burden which pressed unfairly on a certain number of landowners, and was an hereditary burden which ought to be relieved. While he had no sympathy with those persons who said that hereditary burdens ought not to be taken off, or with those people who said that hereditary exceptions ought not to be interfered with. Yet this Land Tax could not be called an hereditary burden in any sense, as it was not a tax really, but a rent charge.

I gather from the hon. Member's remarks that he takes exception to the whole clause, and not Sub-section (1) only. Of course, if the hon. Member was successful in striking out Sub-section (1), Sub-section (2) could not stand alone. If that is so, obviously the remarks of the hon. Member ought to be made when I put the question that Clause 25 stand part of the Bill. That would be the proper place to raise his objection to the whole clause.

Of course, Sir, after your ruling I will limit myself entirely to Sub-section (1).

No, Sir; I rise to order. It is quite impossible that Sub-section (2) should be enacted if Sub-section (1) were struck out, because Sub-section (2) merely applied existing provisions of the law in the event of Sub-section (1) being made the law.

On the point of order, I submit, if the Chancellor of the Exchequer's argument was right, it would apply to every sub-section in any clause, and it might be always argued. I wish to omit the remission of any amount of Land Tax over 1s. in the pound. I do not wish to strike out the whole of the Land Tax, but the actual remission of any amount over 1s. in the pound.

The objection which the hon. Member takes is vital to the whole clause. If the hon. Member is successful in carrying his Amendment, the natural effect would be to strike out Sub-section (2) as well as Sub-section (1). His objection, in other words, is to the root of the whole clause, and therefore the proper time to take it is when the clause is put as a whole. Then the hon. Member would be entitled to urge his objection.

was afraid the effect of the hon. Gentleman's Amendment would be to make the proposal contained in the clause absolutely useless. It would give relief in many cases where relief was not at all required. The idea of the clause was to give relief as regarded a certain proportion of the Land Tax, where it was really a heavy burden. There were more than a hundred parishes in Great Britain where the Land Tax was, perhaps, a mere fraction of a penny in the pound. It would be, in such circumstances, really throwing away money for no purpose whatever to relieve the Land Tax payers in parishes of that kind. They did not feel the burden, which was decreasing every year. What he had endeavoured to do by the clause was to give relief where the Land Tax had become year by year a more serious burden on the land. The hon. Member seemed to think there were many cases where as much as 3s. in the pound would be given by the adoption of the proposal in the Bill. He could assure the hon. Gentleman he was quite wrong. He believed there were only two or three places where the limit of 4s. in the pound had been reached.

There is only one.

said there were, however, many places where it exceeded 1s. in the pound, and in those cases the proposal of the clause was to give relief where relief was required.

asked the right hon. Gentleman to consider whether it had not been a fixed burden before the decrease began in the value of agricultural land, but where year by year, owing to the decrease in the value of agricultural land and the redemption of the Land Tax on houses and the better class of land, in some parishes the Land Tax remaining unredeemed was not possible where boroughs had paid nearly all the Land Tax by annual quotas, to give some compensation to them for having done what they considered to be their duty. Practically they would get no benefit under the 1s., inasmuch as they had paid up under the present scale.

There is a proposal in the Scotch Rating Bill on this point.

observed that the Amendment was to make a reduction of 10 per cent. all round. This theory might be right if the Land Tax payers were paying on the present valuation, but instead of that they were paying on a valuation fixed about a couple of centuries ago. He saw no reason at all for the Amendment.

thought it as well they should understand what the Land Tax really was. It was based upon the law of 1798. At that time the tax was made perpetual, and it was estimated it would produce about £2,000,000 per annum. But there were powers to redeem the Land Tax, which had been exercised in many cases. The tax was divided between different parishes, each of which paid a certain quota to bring together the £2,000,000. It was not dependent upon the amount of property in the parish, one parish paying proportionally more and another less in regard to its property. There was a limit fixed of 4s. in the pound, and if the quota of a parish did not come up to the amount by levying 4s. in the pound, it was reduced. As a matter of fact, he believed there was only one single parish in the country in which the quota of 4s. had been reached. The object of the clause was to reduce the maximum of 4s. to 1s., so that in no case should any parish be obliged to pay more than would be produced by levying 1s. in the pound. The estimate was that the Chancellor of the Exchequer would lose by this £90,000. He confessed he was surprised that the right hon. Gentleman should consent to this loss for the benefit of the landed class, considering that they had already made a very large concession to that class. As far as he had understod it, the plea for doing away with the Land Tax was that the incidence was unfair. But it was a new system to say that because the incidence was unfair, therefore they should sweep away the tax. The proper method of procedure in such a case would be to alter the incidence. But he denied entirely that the incidence was unfair. The Land Tax was really a species of rent paid for the land. In some cases the rent might be higher and in others lower, but it was a first charge upon the land, and to say, because he had to pay what amounted to 2s. in the pound, whereas his neighbour had to pay only 1s., that therefore he was unfairly treated, had nothing to do with it, if they regarded the matter as rent instead of a tax. It certainly did appear to him unfair that considering a large number of persons had redeemed the tax on the old basis, the money should be taken from them on the old basis, and that then those who had redeemed the tax should be let off a portion of the money. Many hon. Members on his side of the House held that the Land Tax on the old basis of 4s. in the pound only represented what the landowners ought to pay in consideration of being let off the feudal duties, ship money, and many other things. Far from redeeming the tax, they were desirous of increasing it. They wanted to go back to the 4s. in the pound which would produce about £11,500,000 sterling. The tendency of all mankind if money were wanted was to get it from his neighbour. [Laughter.] It was a somewhat legitimate principle of self-defence, because taxation affected the individual, and individuals collectively protested against the excessive expenditure which involved excessive taxation. But taxation should be levied in the fairest way. Was it legitimate to reduce this hereditary rent levied on the land, which Radicals said, and always would say, had been reduced far below what it should be. The landowner, and the landowner only, managed to shirk his feudal burdens. Every lawyer knew that his land did not belong to him. It belonged to the State, and he was the tenant; of the State, and now wanted to evade his rent. He could pay it very well, but he tried not to, and he had induced hon. Members opposite to play this game for the landlord's benefit. If the tax were reduced, the entire community, which was composed mainly of poor men, would be fined £90,000 to make up for the remission made to the landlords. He read that morning an interesting account in the The Times of the Convention going on at Chicago. He would not go into the subject of that Convention, because it would not be in order. [Laughter.] But there was one phrase in the account referred to which struck him as applying to the finance of the present Government. The able correspondent of The Times said the finance proposed by the Convention was not finance in the proper sense of the word, but "financial freebooting." This proposal to remit the greater part of the Land Tax was freebooting of the most objectionable kind, designed to benefit the rich at the expense of the poor. ["Hear, hear!"]

pointed out that the remission proposed was not intended to benefit agriculture generally, but to relieve the landlords of a portion of a tax. From its origin the Land Tax had always been a landlord's tax. It was in ancient times the landlord's duty to keep up the Army of the country, and the Land Tax was imposed in lieu of the duties they had to carry out in fighting for the defence of the country. Now the tax had grown old it was proposed not to give everybody who originally had to pay this tax equal relief, and not even to give it to poor landlords, because there was an enormous number of poor landlords who were not able to pay their taxes at all well, and who could hardly keep the land cultivated. These would not get a penny of this remission. The man who spent a large sum on his property to make it good and redeem the Land Tax, because it was a charge that might be dangerous in the future, would not get a penny for the good he had done; but his neighbour who had better land, but who had not been a good landlord in the sense of taking care of his property, and had not redeemed the charge, would get relief from the Government. It was iniquitous to give this dole out of the taxes to a particular section of a class.

said the Land Tax might be looked upon much in the same light as tithe for all practical purposes. Landlords looked upon them both much from the same point of view. All the arguments that could be used in favour of remitting the Land Tax could be used equally as regarded tithe. Land Tax had been paid from very ancient times, and because the landowners had inherited it from their ancestors was no argument for relieving them. He was totally opposed to the Crown remitting to the landowners for their own benefit so large a proportion of the rent it had hitherto received from them. He had always been willing to relieve land from unjust burdens, but he would not be a party to making an absolute gift to the landlords of what was not taxation in the true sense of the word. It might be a good plan to hand over the whole of the Land Tax to the parish councils of the parishes where it was raised for parish purposes. Thus the country at large would get the benefit, and it would be applied for the benefit of the people in the districts where the quota was raised, and where, in some oases, it might seem a heavy tax. Let the tax he remitted, not as a free gift to the landlords, but to the parish, to be used for the benefit of the whole of its inhabitants.

said the proposal embodied in this clause was one of the means adopted by the Chancellor of the Exchequer for getting rid of his surplus, the other two being the Rating Bill and the Education Bill; and the three items amounted to something like £2,500,000, which were to be devoted to the benefit of certain classes of the community. Had he anticipated the means which would be resorted to for getting rid of the surplus he would have adopted a different attitude towards the Naval Works Bill, under which money was to be borrowed for the necessary defence of the nation.

said the money to be spent under the Naval Works Bill this year would be found out of the surplus of last year.

continued that since 1797 the Land Tax had been a charge upon the land of England fixed in perpetuity and subject to redemption and purchase. In the application of the Act to particular areas there was the limit of the quota and also the limit of 4s. in the pound, and what was proposed was to reduce the limit of 4s. to 1s., and thereby remit one-tenth of the tax, and put that proportion into the pockets of those who otherwise would pay it. In his Budget speech the Chancellor of the Exchequer referred to observations that had been made by the late Chancellor of the Exchequer condemnatory of the tax; but the late Chancellor of the Exchequer never went so far as to propose to remit any portion of the tax. Where the tax was more than 1s. in the pound, it was to be assumed that this excess was a hardship on those who had to pay it; but how was this made out? To his mind the Land Tax was nothing but a fixed interest payable annually. The value of the land on which a mortgage was charged might fall, and in proportion to the fall in the mortgage interest, the value of the land would rise; but the mortgage would not rise. What would be thought of a mortgagee who demanded an addition to his interest because the residue had fallen in value, and therefore the proportion he took was smaller in value than it used to be? The share of the State in the land had not increased; it remained a fixed amount; and if the land had fallen in value that was the misfortune of the landlord, whose reversionary interest was depreciated, because the margin available for him was smaller than before. How this was made a case of hardship he could not see. The present First Lord of the Admiralty (Mr. Goschen) in his work on local taxation, published 25 years ago, quoted with approval and concurrence a passage from John Stuart Mill, in which he wrote:—

"That a person owns, a part of the rent does not make the rest of it his just right injuriously withheld from him. The landlords originally held their estates subject to feudal burdens, for which the present Land Tax is an exceedingly small equivalent and for their relief from which they should have boon required to pay a much higher price. There is not the slightest pretence for looking upon it as a payment exacted from the existing race of landlords. It is as if the State had retained, not a portion of the rent, but a portion of the land. The landlords are entitled to no compensation for it, nor have they any claim to its being allowed for as part of their taxes."

[Cheers.] It would be interesting to know whether the First Lord had changed his opinions on this point, and, if he had not, how it came about that he was a party to this proposal. ["Hear, hear!"] Another Member of the Government, whose absence from these Debates they so often had to deplore, was the Secretary for the Colonies (Mr. Chamberlain) who, speaking at Hull in 1885, and describing the burdens of the rich, said:—

"In the first place I think I ought to have included the Land Tax. It is not a tax in the in the proper sense of the word, but it is a State rent, and a very inadequate one."

Then the right hon. Gentleman gave his name to a book which was known as "The Radical Programme," which contained this passage:—

"The Land Tax where it still exists is collected on a valuation made in the reign of William III. It now yields a little over a million, but if it were based on present value it would produce nearly 20 millions."

Yet the right hon. Gentleman was a Member of a Government which came forward with this proposal. In a speech made at Birmingham in 1885, the right hon. Gentleman said:—

"If you go back to the early history of our social system you will find that when our social arrangements first began to shape themselves, every man was born into the world with national rights, with a right to a share in the great inheritance of the community, with a right to a part of the land of his birth. But all those rights have passed away. The common rights of ownership have disappeared. Some of them have been sold; some of them have been given away by people who had no right to dispose of them; some of them have been lost through apathy and ignorance; some have been destroyed by fraud; and some have been acquired by violence. Private ownership has taken the place of these communal rights."

And then, upon that foundation, the right hon. Gentleman put the question which startled the country ten years ago—"What ransom are the private owners of land going to pay for the property in the land which they have taken from the State?" [Opposition cheers.] Why was not the right hon. Gentleman present to defend this proposal, which was ten times more iniquitous than anything that had been complained of either in the Eating Bill or in the Education Bill. [Opposition cheers.] For all that remained to the State of its ancient interest in this land was this Land Tax, and one-tenth of that tax it is now proposed by this Bill to take away. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, perhaps, might rely upon the Report of the Royal Commission on Agriculture. It was undoubtedly true that the majority report and the minority report agreed in the statement that the Land Tax was a hardship and that it ought to be relieved, but the Reports gave no reasons in support of such a contention. The Commissioners committed themselves to the extraordinary proposition—which destroyed any value their Report might have—that not only was the Land Tax a hardship to those who had to pay it, but that the redeemed Land Tax was equally a burden upon those who did not pay it—or, in other words, that the fact that some unknown person, 100 years ago, wiped out the Land Tax on his estate—was an "intolerable burden" upon the man who might have bought the estate in the market last week. [Opposition laughter and Ministerial cries of "He paid more for the estate."] Surely the fact that a man paid more for an estate without the Land Tax than for an estate with the Land Tax could not be seriously said to constitute an intolerable burden. [Opposition cheers.] He would vote against the proposals of the Government with the fullest confidence that his vote was founded upon justice and reason.

said that the hon. Gentleman, during his carefully prepared speech, must have noticed the significant absence of his colleagues from the Front Opposition Bench. [Ministerial laughter.] The hon. Gentleman was good enough to point out that two of his colleagues—who entirely agreed with him in this proposal—were also absent; but if the colleagues of the hon. Gentleman—particularly the right hon. Member for Monmouthshire—really believed with him that the proposal was ten times more iniquitous than either the Education Bill or Rating Bill, they would surely have been present to support him at least with their presence. The hon. Gentleman appeared to think that the Land Tax might well be raised.

No, I expressly disavowed the contention of the right hon. Gentleman the Colonial Secretary ten years ago. I stand by the 1798 settlement.

said he should like to stand by that settlement too. The settlement of 1798 was based upon an old Act of William & Mary, under which not only was land subject to this tax, but ready money, goods, merchandise, and personal property of every kind also. [Ministerial cheers.] Why, under that Act the profits which the hon. Gentleman the Member for Northampton enjoyed by his personal exertions would be taxed—[laughter]—and, further, as the Act, included offices and pensions, the humble salary which the hon. Gentleman the Member for Dundee so well earned as Civil Lord of the Admiralty in the late Government would also be subject to the tax. [Laughter.]

Not under the 1798 settlement.

said it would. It was a curious fact that the law to which he referred remained in force in regard to personal property until 1833, and in respect to offices and pensions until 1876. It had been found by long experience that personalty, being of a very fugitive character, contrived to escape the operation of the Act of William & Mary, and therefore in 1833 personalty was relieved of the tax—a relief which was extended to offices and pensions in 1876. The total loss to the State by these two exonerations from the tax was £132,000 a year. In other words, owners of personalty and holders of certain offices and pensions got a present from Parliament of £132,000 by being relieved of the Land Tax, and yet, when it was now suggested that land, upon which the tax fell heavily, should get some relief, the hon. Gentleman said it was more iniquitous than the Rating Bill or Education Bill. [Cheers.] He regarded it as a very important fact that the Royal Commission on Agriculture, consisting of gentlemen selected for their ability and knowledge of the subject by the late Government—of which the hon. Gentleman the Member for Dundee was a member—unanimously reported in favour of the proposal contained in the Bill. Would the hon. Gentleman suggest that such men as Mr. Shaw Lefevre, Lord Rendel, and Sir Robert Giffen, who signed the report, were unduly favourable to the landed interest.

Yes.

said the hon. Member for Dundee also contended that the proposed relief would extend only to large landed estates. There were as many as 1,400,000 assessments for the Land Tax in England. Of course, there were a great number of these assessments in towns which would receive no relief under the clause, but the figures showed how widely distributed was the tax amongst the owners of the land. The hon. Member could not see any hardship in the fact that though the property which had to bear the tax decreased in value the tax, being a fixed payment, remained the same. He wondered whether, if the hon. Gentleman paid a tax of £100 a year on an income of £1,000 a year, he would think it a hardship if his income fell to £500 and he had to pay the tax of £100 all the same. [Ministerial cheers.] The Royal Commission on Agriculture alluded to the curious inequality of this tax in different parts of the country. The assessment of the Land Tax was indeed, a very old assessment. It dated from many hundred years ago; and, as it was attempted at that time to assess the land faithfully according to its value, naturally the corn-growing land was by far the most heavily assessed. The result, as quoted by the Commission, was that, while in 1797 Hertfordshire's quota was fixed at £41,500, that of Lancashire was fixed at £21,900. Now, of course, the valuation of Lancashire was at least 14 times as great as that of Hertfordshire. As the value of the corn-growing land had diminished, the burden of the Land Tax had increased; and, further, where the Land Tax had been redeemed in the case of building land or land used for railways, an increased burden had been thrown on the neighbouring agricultural land. The Royal Commission declared that nearly one-fourth of the quotas of the Land Tax remaining unredeemed fell upon Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Wilt- shire, and Lincolnshire—and those were the counties where the depression was most felt. The Commission quoted the following cases where the Land Tax had increased within the last 15 years: In Essex, in one parish from 1s. 4½d. to 4s., in another from 1s. 2d. to 2s. 6d., in another from 1s. 1d. to 2s. 3d.; in Norfolk, in one parish from 1s. to 2s., in another from 6¼d. to 1s. 2½d.; in Suffolk, in one parish from 1s. 9¼d. to 3s. 0¼d., in another from 1s. 0¾d. to 2s. 6d.; in Lincolnshire, in one parish from 9¼d. to 3s. 2d.; and in Wiltshire, in one parish from 1s. 1d. to 2s. 2d., and in another from 1s. 1d. to 3s. ["Hear, hear!"] The Commission recommended that steps should be taken to reduce the terms of redemption as proposed in this Bill, and also that the maximum rate of the Land Tax should be reduced. That was the root of the proposals in the Bill. The hon. Member for Somerset asked why the proposals should not be extended to the Land Tax which had already been redeemed. Only in a very few cases had any redemption been effected at a rate above that fixed in the clause. He would remind the Committee that what was proposed was not a permanent but a temporary remission. The quota in any parish was not to exceed 1s. in the pound on the assessment of the parish under Schedule A of the Income Tax. But if, owing to increase of value, the increased assessment should take the parish outside the operation of the clause, then the original quota would have to be paid again. He believed that the remission was well deserved, and that there was no part of the proposals of the Government with regard to agriculture which would be more welcome or which were more necessary and fair. [Cheers.]

said that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had properly remarked on the condition of the front Opposition Bench, but he had drawn the wrong inference. It was not that the Leaders of the Opposition thought this question was a financial bagatelle which did not require their attention. They must be well aware that no more serious question for a large number of persons had been raised during the present Session. It seemed to him that the Gentlemen who usually occupied the front Opposition Bench were unworthily afraid to face the question. [Ironical cheers and laughter, which were renewed as Sir W. Harcourt entered the House and took his seat.] He had seen dramatic demonstrations, conscious and unconscious, by the right hon. Gentleman before this, but never one more successful. [Laughter.] But how could the right hon. Gentleman deal with a discussion which he had not heard? It was a task which would be difficult for himself, but not impossible for the right hon. Gentleman. He could not agree with his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Dundee when he described the observations on this subject made by the present Colonial Secretary some years ago as "bogus history and claptrap philosophy." That was a smart phrase which led one to overstate the case. In those days the Colonial Secretary was sounder on history, social philosophy, and everything else on which he required to be sound, than at the present day. There were hundreds and thousands in the country who sympathised with the lead given to them in those days by the Colonial Secretary. He was surprised that these proposals had not received more attention. They were not to be measured simply by an arithmetical standard, but by the significance of the broad principle involved, and that was the abolition of the Land Tax as far as the Government dare attempt it. [Cheers and laughter.] The tax was at present 4s. in the pound—[crien of "No!"]—and the proposal of the Government was to reduce it to 1s. in the pound. [Cries of "No!"] He was not looking at the question from the arithmetical point of view only. [Laughter.] That was the tendency of the proposal. He would say "ditto" to Mr. Mill in asserting that 4s. in the pound was a very inadequate Land Tax, and there were many people who held the same opinion. Would they be as contented with these proposals as were the occupants of the Front Opposition Bench? [Laughter.] He had not had the time to prepare an informed speech; his information on this subject was mainly of a general character. [Ironical cheers and laughter.] He rose, however, for the purpose of assisting his hon. Friends in doing what they could to emphasise the alarming importance of this proposal, and he trusted that the effect of the discussion would be to call popular attention more significantly and more emphatically to the proposal of the Government.

, whose rising was received with Ministerial laughter and cheers, said that if the hon. Member had given him notice that he was going to make an ill-informed speech de omnibus rebus—[Ministerial laughter and cheers]—he would have been in attendance. But by some misfortune whenever he was in the House he never saw the hon. Member—[laughter]—and therefore he was deprived of the opportunities of meeting him which he should desire. [Laughter.] Unfortunately he had, owing to the position he had occupied in the Government, to inform himself on the subject of the Land Tax, and he had to descend from the empyrean heights lately occupied by the hon. Member, and had to regard this as an arithmetical question. [Laughter.] When the hon. Member had descended from those heights and was able to inform himself of the fact that the Land Tax bore very hardly on poor and distressed districts, when in short he had mastered the elements of the question, he would then be able to address the House not less eloquently, but probably with better information. [Laughter and cheers.] Having had to consider the question of distressed agriculture and the incidence of the Land Tax, he did last year say that he thought the Land Tax was a tax which was oppressive in its character, especially in the distressed districts of the country, and that on counties like Essex, which had suffered very much from agricultural distress, it operated in a most unfair and unequal manner. He said on that occasion that, if it remained for him to deal with the matter, he thought the Land Tax in its present form was a bad tax; if it was to exist it ought to be by equalising it and remedying its heavy incidence on the parts of the country which were least able to bear it. He had always held that they ought to adjust their system of finance so that it should fall most lightly on the parts least able to bear it, and the absurdity of the condition of the Land Tax in Essex as compared with Lancashire was one of the greatest blots on our financial system. Personally he had no opportunity of bringing forward a specific proposal for relief, and though he could not say that this was exactly the scheme he would have proposed, yet, inasmuch as it would give relief from a burden which he could scarcely regard in many parts of the country as in the nature of a differential tax, he did not feel in a position to oppose the proposal of the Government. [Ministerial cheers.]

said that the inequality of the so-called tax did not meet the point raised by those who objected to the proposed remission. He admitted everything that could be said about the inequality of this so-called burden, but he should like to ask whether this was a tax or whether in substance it was not a national property. [Cheers.] If it was purely a tax it might be properly remitted; if it was a national property, no matter how unequal in its incidence, it ought not to be remitted unless compensation be given for it. He was astonished to find that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had not ventured to repeat what he said when the Budget was introduced. The right hon. Gentleman put into most explicit terms the point for which he and his hon. Friends were now contending. The Chancellor of the Exchequer then said that since 1798 this tax had not been an ordinary tax at all, but that it was in truth a rent charge allowed for by all those who had been purchasers or vendors of land since that date. The right hon. Gentleman had thus made clear the character of this sub-section, and had shown that the Committee were not dealing with the case of the remission of a tax, but were making a gift of national property. The right hon. Gentleman might even have gone further back than 1798; for this Land Tax had been perhaps the only compensation for the abolition of feudal burdens, which had been exacted from the landowners of the country, and it would never have been made perpetual if its character as a national property rather than a national tax had not been recognised. It was now proposed to give away a handsome slice of this property. It was within the competence of the Committee to do so, but let hon. Members understand what they were doing. Do not let them understand that they were remitting a tax like the Tea Duty. This clause proposed to put into the pockets of a particular class money which had never been theirs since 1798. It was, therefore, somewhat fallacious for hon. Members to refer to a Measure of this kind as a Measure of landlord relief. It might be far more correctly described as a Measure of landlord endowment. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had spoken of the clause as if it merely remitted about £100,000 of Land Tax. In form it did, but he pointed out that the remission under Clause 25 was but a small part of the ultimate remission which the landowners would secure. Two reasons were alleged for remission or redemption. In some parts of the country the tax was so small that it was not worth collecting; in other parts of the country it was large, and well worth collecting. On both of those not consistent grounds it was attacked. Then there were the intermediate cases, with regard to which landowners were invited to redeem on terms which gave them substantial profit in the present state of the money market, so as to secure the ultimate extinction of the tax. And the Chancellor of the Exchequer was doing this at a time when he himself had warned the Committee that they had reached the limits of direct taxation. This clause raised a question of far wider Imperial importance—namely, whether they ought to restrict the sphere of direct taxation. That had already become one of the most pressing and acute modern political questions. The Chancellor of the Exchequer in his Budget speech told the House that they had reached the limits of direct taxation. That meant that they were within measurable distance of the taxation of imports. In these circumstances they certainly could not afford to throw away any source of direct revenue; if they did, they would be a step nearer the time predicted by the right hon. Gentleman himself, when they would have to lay a tax on the trade of the people—the bread of the people. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman would say whether that prospect gave him pleasure, and whether the remission of the Land Tax was intended to bring them nearer to this retrograde policy in finance. Those who desired to keep the commerce of the country unfettered and its bread cheap would not willingly part with any source of direct revenue. The arguments used against giving up the Tea Duty applied with greater force against the surrender of a source of revenue which put a burden on no man's trade and raised the price of no man's food.

thanked the hon. Member for Edinburgh for drawing from the Leader of the Opposition a statement in support of the Government on this point. He was one of those who regarded the Leader of the Opposition as one of the first financial authorities in the country, and he should have hesitated to express his own view on this question had it not been in accord with that of the right hon. Gentleman. He did not recognise that this proposal did away with an element of direct taxation. It would still be quite within the House to tax land in this country higher than it did if it was thought equitable or desirable to do so. He believed that when the people understood this question, they would not oppose the proposal of the Government. A great deal that was misleading and inaccurate had been spoken and written about it. No one would accuse him of being unduly favourable to the landed interest, and he had strongly opposed the Agricultural Rating Bill; but that touched an altogether different question. The last speaker had given away the argument on the ground of inequality, and now the basis of the opposition was that this was a hereditary charge and a national property. But when the tax was instituted it was imposed equally on personal property and on land. The Act of 1692, which was an Act for raising a war tax, provided that every person or corporation—

"having any estate in ready moneys or in any debts owing to them, or having any estate in goods, wares, merchandise, or other chattels or personal estate whatsoever, within this realm or without, shall yield and pay unto their Majesties four shilling's in the pound according to the true yearly value thereof."

The clause taxing land was a subsequent one. Personal property came first. The Acts of 1692 and 1697 were on the same lines in that respect, and so was the Act of 1797. The Report of the Inland Revenue of 1870, which gave the history of this tax says:—

"It is a remarkable circumstance that these Acts of 1697 and 1797 appear to mark, more strongly than before, the taxation of personal estate as the primary object of the law."

That portion of the law which affected personal property was allowed to fall into abeyance, and only the portion relating to land was kept in force. But it was no more a feudal burden in the one case than in the other. In the old days there was very little property capable of taxation except land, and therefore land gave the bulk of the revenue of the country, but to suggest that they should tax land specially for that portion of the revenue that was derived purely from the capital expended on it was not a fair thing. A system of taxing what were commonly spoken of as "land values" would be more equitable. They ought to tax very fully the increased value given to land by its surroundings, by the growth of population, and by the improvements in towns. It was not a sufficient ground for maintaining an unjust tax that it was old. If they were going back to the old law, would they enforce it against personalty as well as against land? The taxation of land was a question for the towns more than for the country, and if the landlords and farmers would only join in seeing that sufficient taxation was placed on the owners of unearned increment on land in the towns, they would open up a source of revenue which would give relief to all. He referred to the sale of a small plot of land in Cornhill at the rate of £2,500,000 an acre, maintaining that it would not have been unjust if practically the whole of the increase value given to that land by its surroundings had been taxed for the benefit of the people. The present he admitted was an unfortunate time for relieving the landed interest, but he was not disposed to refuse to do an act of justice because Parliament was doing an act of justice in another direction.

believed that this question of the Land Tax attracted in a very extraordinary degree the attention of a large section of the public, and he thought they would make a great mistake if they left that out of account. He agreed that it was a great misfortune that the land laws of this country were in the condition they were. It would have been well if the State could have kept a much larger control over the land and taken a much larger share of its profits; but the evils which existed were evils which were created a very long time ago by the laxity and intention, it might be, of Parliament, and they could not redress them. Therefore, he put that out of account, and it seemed to him that the question on which they had to vote was a very narrow one indeed. The defence of this proposition by the Chancellor of the Exchequer was plausible enough, and he was not one of those who took the view that there was not a case of great hardship in these localities, and one well worth the attention of Parliament. The question was whether the proposal for the remedy was a justifiable one. To his mind the particular form of relief recommended by the Commission, and adopted by the Government, was a very bad form indeed. The Chancellor of the Exchequer made his argument turn upon a word which, he thought, was wholly fallacious in this connection—the word "burden." They had a burden when they had a tax or an imposition upon something that a person had got, but if a person had not got the thing they could not put a burden upon it. The land had been, for nearly a century, subject to this imposition, and it had been bought and sold as though the subject matter of the imposition were not the subject matter of the sale. That brought him to what seemed to him to be the first defect in connection with the Chancellor of the Exchequer's proposal—namely, that it was really unfair to the people who had redeemed the Land Tax. ["Hear, hear!"] On the assurance of the State that it had imposed a permanent burden, taking the view that this was not the subject of property at all, but a slice out of this property which, as it were, belonged to the State, and that there was only one set of terms—those enacted by the State—on which they could redeem it, these people had spent their money in redeeming the Land Tax. They had redeemed it for nothing, and for something worse than nothing, because they were now going to be indirectly taxed to make up the deficiency and to pay for the relief of the burden on those who were not thrifty enough, or in a position to redeem their own Land Tax. There was another thing in connection with the proposal which he did not like. What they were really doing was, under cover of one proposition, making quite a different proposition. If they had wished to make a remission which would reach the localities in this way, why did they not take the School Board rate or something that had come into existence much more recently, say in better times? Instead of that they were taking as the object of the remission a burden which was selected in times when land yielded far less than it did 20 or 30 years ago, and probably less than it yielded now—they were taking something out of the slice which was the State's, which had been the State's for a very long time, and which was never the owner's of the land, and they were giving it back to him. ["Hear, hear!"] Another objection which he had to this proposal was that it was not really a candid and straightforward way of legislating. He for one would have regarded with very great sympathy a candid proposition to give direct relief to the people of those localities where agriculture was peculiarly distressed. The proposal of the Government was put, he would not say in an uncandid form, but in an awkward form—a form which seemed to be economically objectionable and objectionable from the point of view of policy. He could not help feeling that, when he went into the Lobby, which would not be the Lobby in which the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition would be, he should at least have his sympathy, because he had gathered from the closing words of his speech that if he had been dealing with this problem it would not have been in this bad and objectionable form he would have brought forward his proposition for this local and partial relief.

said the reason why personalty had been finally excluded in England was because from 1798 to 1883 it diminished from £133,000 to £5,000. The abolition in England was the result of the advice of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, because of the great burden that had been placed on the annual value of personal property which had not then affected and had only lately affected land as well as property. He was astonished at the speech of the right hon. Member for West Monmouth, because he remembered the very strong opposition he led to the Agricultural Rating Bill. It did seem to him that if they had agriculture depressed and that if this Land Tax rent charge was a burden upon agriculture, surely local rates were a much greater burden, and every argument that applied to the relief of this old hereditary burden would be much more powerfully applied to the relief of the new burdens which the right hon. Gentleman himself so strongly opposed. But were the Government willing to go on relieving agriculture, because if so there was one burden which pressed still more than either the one that had been relieved under the Rating Bill or the one proposed to be relieved under this clause. This was the tithe rent charge, which was the heaviest burden. If they were going to take off the State's charge, were they going to take off the parson's charge as well? It had been urged that the present Land Tax was unequal and unjust, but if the right hon. Gentleman would read the Debates at the time this tax was made perpetual in 1798 he would find that the then Member for Caithness, Sir John Sinclair, very strongly opposed the making of the tax perpetual because of its inequality and injustice. Sir John pointed out how the tax amounted to 6d. in the pound in Lancashire and Yorkshire, while in other districts it was as much as 2s., 3s., 3s. 6d. and 4s., so that it was unequal then, and its incidence unjust precisely as it was at the present time. Mr. Pitt realised that, and showed that the reason why it had been unequal was that under the 4th William & Mary each one of these districts, counties, and parishes had to make an annual return, and every year the Land Tax, both from land and personal property, was becoming less and less, although the land was increasing in value. Then by the 11th of William & Mary it was made perpetual as to the amount on the valuation of seven years before, which very much increased it. They were now paying upon a valuation made two hundred years ago. The tax was made perpetual by Mr. Pitt in 1789, for the purpose of redemption, at 4s. in the pound, and one half had now been redeemed. The Chancellor of the Exchequer argued that this was a tax upon agricultural land. But the very Act itself set forth that it was also a tax upon mills, mines, ironworks, and other industries. They were told that in various parishes the tax was becoming more and more unequal. That was an argument for making a change in the present method of levying it so that the burden should be equal upon all. If the present clause were carried the inequality would not be remedied. The Chancellor of the Exchequer suggested that in small districts where quotas were paid, and where, in consequence of changes in the valuation, the taxes had been increased beyond 1s. in the pound. What might be done was that which was attempted to be done sixty years ago, but which was prevented by the Courts of Law, namely, that instead of having the small areas which were now making the quotas, they should group such areas together and let the burden be alike on all the people. At present in one part of a parish the tax might be one shilling in the pound whilst in another part of the same parish it might only be a penny or even less. When the tax was freed two hundred years ago, some districts were then prosperous which had since become depressed, and in these the burden was heavy. Other districts were at that time poor, which, in consequence of the discovery of coal or iron and their subsequent industrial development, were now prosperous, and here the people were paying practically nothing. The first thing to do was to see that the tax was imposed fairly upon all classes who had not redeemed. If the Chancellor of the Exchequer had levelled up where the tax was too low, and brought it down to the same level where it was too high, instead of reducing the amount, he should have been glad to have supported him. But instead of levelling up in those districts where the burden was now trifling, the right hon. Gentleman allowed them to remain as they were, and that class of property did not, consequently, bear its fair share. The right hon. Gentleman was making a change as to the valuation which was fixed two hundred years ago, and why not make it all round? Why should one class have a light burden in one district whilst the same class in another district had to bear a very heavy burden, simply because two hundred years ago one was a poor district which had now become rich, whilst the other was a rich district which had now become poor.

observed that the hon. Gentleman in his somewhat discursive speech had suggested to him for about the sixth time—(laughter)—that he should attempt to level the Land Tax upwards. He could not conceive any more difficult or impracticable task for a Chancellor of the Exchequer to try and carry through Parliament. They had had a general discussion of the clause on both sides of the Committee, and he hoped they would now be allowed to go to a division. ("Hear, hear!")

desired to emphasise the fact that by the votes that were given in favour of this clause they were going to present £100,000 a year, according to the estimate of the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself, to the landlords of this country. They were giving this £100,000 a year to the landlords, not in indirect relief, but practically in cash. This free gift was made at a time when the Government had appointed an Inquiry into the whole question of local burdens. They were making this present on their own responsibility to the landlords, while they had pledged themselves to an Inquiry into the whole system of local taxation. It was a curious time to give this further dole to the landlords. They might have waited until the Inquiry was concluded. The right hon. Gentleman knew that whatever the result of the Inquiry, this dole would remain. He could not understand the position of those who objected to voting £2,000,000 a year under the Agricultural Rating Bill, but now said that was not enough, others would give the landlords £100,000 a year more. He objected to every proposal of the Government this Session for the benefit of the landlords. Almost every Bill had had that object. Whether the Finance Bill, the Agricultural Rating Bill, the Diseases of Animals Bill or the relief from taxation in regard to pictures, all came to one thing, "Let us give money to the landlords and make hay while the sun shines." He, as a Radical, objected to this relief of the landlords from taxation and he would be no party to giving them £100,000 a year more.

I move that the Question be now put. [Cheers.]

If the discussion is much more protracted I shall be obliged to accept the Motion though I do not do so now.

said he desired to see land taxation levied on a uniform basis throughout the country. But the greatest obstacle to this was the continued existence of the Land Tax, which bristled with anomalies and abuses, and made difficult and well nigh impossible the imposition of a proper system of land taxation. Therefore, it was desirable either by facilitating the mode of redemption or other means to get rid of the Land Tax before imposing a new Land Tax which should be on an equitable system. It had been argued as if this tax were a permanent and fixed amount. It was as far as parishes were concerned, but it was no longer fixed as regarded individuals. It had been raised with regard to them, but a fixed quota was imposed upon each parish. Owing to the depression in agriculture, large properties had had their valuation lowered, and it had been necessary to get more from smaller properties to make up the amount. Seeing our inequitable system of land taxation, he did not protest against the proposed remission of the Land Tax. To revise the present Land Tax would be a fruitless task. The only way in which our system of land taxation could be reformed, would be to abolish the present Land Tax and substitute an entirely new one.

objected strongly to the proposed grant of £100,000 in the shape of reduced Land Tax. The gross value of the land in his own county of Leicester was 2½ millions, and the Land Tax upon it amounted to £20,000, but if he looked to Durham he found that the gross value of the land was 5 millions, and the Land Tax was only £3,500. Why was this? In Leicestershire they paid at the rate of 8¾d., and in Westmorland they paid little more than 1d. an acre. These were inequalities that required adjustment by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, but for the present he would content himself by making his most solemn and emphatic protest against any further dole being made to the landlords. ["Hear, hear!"] He held with Sir Robert Giffen that this so-called Land Tax was not a Land Tax at all. It was simply an interest reserved by the State when it handed over to individuals the rest of the land of this country. It was in the nature of a rent charge, which had been reserved, and the Government had no more right to hand over the Land Tax to any set of individuals than they had to hand over Hyde Park to them. [Cheers.] The land of this country was originally purchased with the full knowledge of the Land Tax which was upon it, and the successors of those who bought the land ought to think themselves fortunate that they got it on such easy terms. ["Hear, hear!"] This was the last protest he would make. [Cheers.] He had been in that House long enough to clearly understand the objections which hon. Members opposite had to hearing a word said on behalf of the poor men of this country. [Cheers.] He was looking, as he had a right to look, to the days of depression which had come on this country, and he asked himself when those days arrived how were the many poor men who were now only just able to keep their heads above water—how were they to meet the additional taxation which this Government was placing on their shoulders for the most exclusive benefit of a certain class. Land at present only paid 26 pence, as against 42 pence paid by other kinds of property, and this Government had already shifted half of the burden of the rates on land on to the shoulders of the men in the towns, who already paid the heavier portion of the taxation. The Government were strong, and he asked them to be merciful, and have more consideration for those men who to-day were paying a much greater share of their small incomes in taxation than the richest men in the country. [Cheers.]

rose to continue the discussion, when

claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."

said that he could not agree with the hon. Member. The tithe rent-charge was now redeemable at 25 years' purchase—five years less than the term he proposed. When the Land Tax was made permanent by Mr. Pitt in 1798 as a quid pro quo favourable terms for redemption were offered. During the next two years the rate of redemption was only 20 years' purchase, and £500,000 out of the £850,000 which had been redeemed up to this time was redeemed in those first two years. Since then the value of the funds had more than doubled, and the rate of redemption had therefore increased until now it was about 37 years' purchase. In 1853 Mr. Gladstone dealt with it, the rate then being 35¾ years' purchase, and the rate was reduced to 29½ years' purchase. Again the price of redemption had risen, and the Royal Commission had unanimously recommended that it was too high. If it should happen that the Funds went down again, the State would be a considerable gainer by the terms of redemption having been separated from the price of the funds.

said that the Land Tax was redeemed in the first instance, on condition that an equal amount of Consols would be wiped out; so that the State lost nothing. Consols were then at 48; but in four years, in consequence of the redemption, the price rose to 70. In 1813 a reduction of three years' purchase was made in the redemption price; Mr. Gladstone further reduced it; and now it would be said that the present Chancellor of the Exchequer had reduced the price again by ten years' purchase. Reading this clause with the others that followed, it appeared that the Government were creating a new class of investment. The owner could redeem the Land Tax at 30 years' purchase; then under the next clause he could make the purchase money a first charge on the land; and that mortgage could easily be sold for 35 or 40 years' purchase. Consols were now at 112, and they would soon be bearing only a nominal 2½ per cent., or actually less than 2 per cent. That was 50 years' purchase. There would, no doubt, be a great deal of redemption; and he should like to know the Chancellor of the Exchequer's estimate of the nation's loss by these transactions.

said that the great evil of the Land Tax was its inequality, and as long as they had the Land Tax the only way of really getting equality was through redemption. There was great fallacy in supposing that the Land Tax in its origin was something specially and exclusively connected with the land. That was an ignorant idea; and he would give a most curious illustration of the point. He had in his hand the correspondence of Mr. Canning with a note by his private Secretary as to the official increment Mr. Canning enjoyed in 1827. As first Commissioner of the Treasury Mr. Canning had £4,022 a year, from which was deducted £653 12s. for Land Tax. ["Hear, hear!"] He did not know when salaries ceased to pay Land Tax, but he thought that the above illustration would bring home to his hon. Friends the utter fallacy of supposing that this tax has special reference to land in its origin or inception. It was also a mistake to suppose that the tax was unalterable in its incidence. Those who had studied the question of the Land Tax, its incidence and redemption, had been impressed by its inequality, which was so great that it must be got rid of. He reminded the Committee, when it was said this was a present to a particular class, that he made a larger present than was now proposed to the owners of land in the Budget of 1890. Why? Because he was of opinion that the manner in which the Income Tax was raised on the gross instead of the net was an unequal form of taxation. He understood that the object of the terms of redemption now being discussed was to encourage and facilitate redemption. After the usual interval Mr. GRANT LAWSON (York, N.R., Thirsk), took the chair.

said the Land Tax was originally a tax upon land paid by the landlord as a relief from military service to the Crown. The point was that when this charge was abolished so far as personalty was concerned, it was a fact that certain local burdens on personalty had increased. But the charge upon land was continued, and this charge had been taken into account by Parliament at all times when dealing with the land question. He believed it was true that in certain districts there was a certain amount of injustice, and that was a case for consideration and inquiry. In his opinion, instead of reducing this tax to this enormous extent, the Government ought to wait until the Commission had reported on the question. The right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer had said, that that House ought to encourage people to redeem this tax, but the effects of the proposal of the Government would be, instead of encouraging people to redeem the tax immediately, to induce them to wait in the hope that it would be entirely abolished. In fact, he could only regard those who had not redeemed the tax up to now as very lucky men, because they were going to get relief to the extent of £100,000 a year.

said that he had been astonished by the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Monmouthshire in respect to this question.

called the hon. Member to order. He was not speaking to the Amendment before the House, which was to substitute the term of 40 years for 30 years.

said that of course he would bow to the ruling of the Chair, but he could not help saying that in that case the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Monmouth must have been out of order also. He wanted to know, in the first place, how much the country was going to lose by this proposal on the part of the Government. Between the years 1840 and 1850 the amount of Land Tax redeemed was comparatively small, but that amount had very largely increased after Mr. Gladstone had, in 1853, brought in a Bill reducing the number of years' purchase at which the tax could be redeemed from 36½ years to 29½ years. Now it was proposed to reduce the term of 29½ years to 10 years. What the Government were doing was to surrender an excellently secured tax in order that the owner might acquire the charge at 10 years' purchase, and then take it into the market and sell it at 37½ years' purchase.

said that the tax pressed unequally in different parts of the kingdom, because it was very heavy in some counties and very light in others. The question before the Committee was at what rate the Land Tax ought to be allowed to be redeemed. The proposal of the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer would enable the landowners to dip their hands still deeper into the national purse than they had hitherto done. As the matter would stand if the Government proposal were accepted, a man who paid £100 per annum for Land Tax would be able to redeem it for £3,000, which would bring in far less to the State than the £100 a year. Having regard to the enormous presents lately made to the landowners, it was too much to ask the House to give them something more. His hon. Friend had shown clearly how advantageous the redemption would be to landowners, and having regard to the low rate of interest at the present time, the landlords would not hesitate to take advantage of the law after the passing of this Bill, and they would derive enormous benefit from it.

thought that those who opposed the Amendment had dwelt rather unjustly on the fact that his hon. Friend ignored the unequal incidence of this tax. His hon. Friend did not ignore it. He recognised it and protested against too easy terms being offered to the landlords. A great deal of the legislation of this Session up to the present time had been in relief of landlords, and this was another form of relief. The landlords were now offered redemption on what were considered by competent authorities altogether unequal and unjust terms. There was no doubt that there would shortly be a considerable rise in the price of land. Such a rise would undoubtedly follow the legislation of this Session, yet the landlords were to be allowed to redeem the Land Tax on ridiculously easy terms. It was extremely inconvenient that the speech of the Leader of the Opposition should have been made, and his followers should not be allowed to criticise it. The right hon. Gentleman's statement had altogether astounded them. They did not conceive that there was anything of the kind in existence until that night. It was a most tempting theme, and one would have liked to follow it right. He entirely endorsed the Amendment of his hon. Friend, and he hoped he would mark his objection to the clause by dividing against it.

said the question was whether a 3⅓ per cent. investment was a liberal one at the present time. He thought the Chancellor of the Exchequer would be disposed to admit that, considering the price of money, rather too favourable terms were offered. When they were considering the Light Railways Bill the other day, the right hon. Gentleman suggested that 3⅛ per cent. was a fair rate at which money might be lent by the Treasury. Why, then, should he give this favoured class an investment at 3⅓ per cent.? The thing that astonished him was the moderate suggestion of his hon. Friend. He really thought the Chancellor of the Exchequer might give a little more consideration to it. It was evident that the figure 30 times the sum was not just, considering the price of money. It was a great boon to get the tax extinguished, and therefore, surely 3⅓ per cent. might be charged for the money. Some figure ought to be fixed in the Bill that would cause no loss to the Treasury, and if 40 could not be accepted, why not 35 or 33? He would like to ask one question of the right hon. Gentleman. The clause said that the owner of the land might redeem. He would like to know whether there were not some owners of the Land Tax who were not owners of the land? Were those people to be allowed to redeem the tax on the same favourable terms?

No.

asked why they should be treated worse than the landlords? The policy of the Government seemed to be that unless a man held the land, no measure of justice should be meted out to him. At any rate, he thought the transaction should be carried out without loss to the Treasury.

said that under the existing law the transaction incurred no loss to the Treasury, but under the proposal of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, this would be altered and a loss would be incurred. If there was to be redemption the State ought to be careful to obtain the market price, and even 40 years' purchase would be rather less than the present market price. The Chancellor of the Exchequer could not argue that he proffered these favourable terms to meet cases of distress, because the same right of redemption would be enjoyed in cases where the burden was light as in cases where the burden was heavy. Was there any reason why the State should allow redemption to take place at less than the market price? What the Government was doing was to give a present to the existing owner of the land. The future owner would not benefit, for the present owner would raise the money necessary for redemption by mortgage on his property, and the future owner would have to pay the equivalent of the Land Tax in interest. The Government had introduced a Bill which would abolish Land Tax in burghs in Scotland. Was it likely that the landlords in these burghs were going to redeem? The Committee had not been given any reason why there should be any departure from the existing practice regulating redemption.

said that it was admitted that this was a most unequal tax, and since the time of Pitt it had been the object of Parliament to facilitate the redemption of the tax. The existing terms did not secure its redemption; in fact, redemption at the present price of Consols had practically ceased. The Government therefore proposed to tempt landowners to redeem by offering them more favourable terms. If the proposal were rejected the process of redemption would be stopped altogether, and he could not conceive that that would be a benefit either to the State or to individuals.

observed that the argument that it was desirable to redeem the Land Tax because it was unequal could be used with even greater force in support of a proposal to abolish tithe. The right hon. Gentleman said that it was desirable to tempt those who paid Land Tax to redeem, but why was it desirable? It was true that hitherto it had been the policy of Parliament to induce landlords to redeem upon terms which were beneficial to the Treasury, but the terms now offered would cause loss to the Treasury. Was it for the benefit of the public that the tax should be redeemed? He doubted it. When Mr. Pitt introduced his plan the tax amounted to £2,000,000. By redemptions, year after year, half of that sum was now gone. It had been squandered. The only result of capitalising that money had been to induce extravagance on the part of the Treasury. [The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER: "It has gone to pay off the National Debt."] ["Hear, hear!"] He knew that; it had been whittled away by the Treasury in payment of debts that ought never to have been encountered. [The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER said that the Treasury had never had the money, which had gone through the hands of the National Debt Commissioners.] ["Hear, hear!"] It mattered little through whose hands the money had passed. His point was that it was a perfectly proper policy on the part of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to redeem the Land Tax, but that hitherto the policy had been to redeem it upon terms which had been favourable to the Treasury, and that now they were having a departure from that policy. The terms which Pitt offered were so much 3 per cent. stock as would produce a dividend exceeding the amount of the Land Tax by one-tenth—a proposal whereby the Treasury gained £400,000. He could understand the Chancellor of the Exchequer entering into a scheme of redemption which would benefit the Treasury of this country to that extent. From the point of view of public policy, it would be an advantage. But what was the proposal of the Chancellor of the Exchequer? He said let the Land Tax be redeemed at 30 times the amount assessed on such land. That meant that if they redeemed the whole of the Land Tax at that price it would be a loss to the Exchequer of £250,000 per annum. If they capitalised that, it was a loss of £10,000,000. The Chancellor of the Exchequer said this was the policy of Parliament; of past Chancellors of the Exchequer; but he would ask the Committee whether there was not a vast difference between a policy of redeeming the Land Tax upon terms which would benefit the Treasury to the extent of £400,000 a year, and upon terms which would involve an annual loss to the Treasury of £250,000 per annum.

said he entirely adopted the view expressed by the hon. and learned Member for Haddington on a previous clause, when he said that this could not be properly considered a tax in the ordinary sense of the word. They could not deal with this matter as an ordinary tax varying from year to year according to the necessities of the Exchequer. Those who had bought estates in this country had bought them subject to the Land Tax. They had not bought the Land Tax, and they had no right to expect to have a remission or redemption of it. An hon. Member opposite, when challenged on the subject said he did maintain the proposition that the Land Tax which had been redeemed years ago was still a burden on the landowners of the country. The meaning of that statement was that if they made a reduction, according to the hon. Member's view, in the Land Tax, they ought in justice to recoup those on whose estates the Land Tax had been redeemed and wiped off long ago at an enormously high rate. Of course, the hon. Member was quite right. He did not admit that it was an unjust tax, although its incidence was unequal, any more than he should admit that a quit-rent was unjust because in one district of the country it was high, and in another district it was low. He challenged and took issue on the first proposition of the Chancellor of the Exchequer that it was desirable, and that everybody ought to desire, to redeem this Land Tax. He did not think it was desirable to do anything of the sort, and therefore he held that it was not competent for the Government, if they meant to act honestly by the Exchequer, to offer tempting terms to induce men to redeem their Land Tax. The Chancellor of the Exchequer stated that the money accruing from the redemption of the Land Tax passed into the hands of the National Debt Commissioners, and that it was used in the reduction of the debt. What they were entitled to demand was that the Chancellor of the Exchequer should prove to them that under this new scheme of his, the redemption of £100 of Land Tax a year would strike off £100 of the National Debt. He claimed that the right hon. Gentleman should show to the Committee, before they were called upon to pass this clause, that there would not be a dead loss to the Exchequer by the operation of this new system. The proposal before the Committee now was this—not only were they under Clause 25, to give £9,000 a year as a present to the landowners of the country, but to follow that up by admitting them to terms which would inflict a further loss upon the Treasury. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, at any rate, ought to allow such a number of years' purchase to be inserted in the clause as would prevent any loss.

complained that no answer had been given to his point that the Treasury had got no security. At present they had a certain property, but the Government were going to substitute for that another property which was less, although they did not gain anything by it except that the present miserably small rate of redemption might go on. What was the good of their squandering their property like this to no purpose? It was entirely from the Treasury point of view that he had put the case. He contended that the Treasury were getting too bad a bargain, and it was upon that point, to which there had been no answer, that he should take a Division.

remarked that it was no use his attempting to lay before the Committee again the reasons he had twice endeavoured to impress upon them, and to which he had nothing to add. He would, however, venture to say that the time was getting on, and their sitting was likely to be a prolonged one unless the Amendments were disposed of in a reasonable time. He hoped that the Committee would now come to a decision on the subject.

said the Redemption Act and its provisions as to the investment of the proceeds to be derived from the redemption of the tax under the clause was not interfered with by this Bill. The object of the Redemption Act was declared to be intended—

"materially to conduce to the strengthening and supporting the public credit and augmenting the national resources."

This was to be effected under the Act by employing the money obtained on the redemption of the tax, in the purchase of 3 per cent. Consols or Reduced Bank Annuities since altered into Consols. Now, the purchase or redemption money of the £1,860,000 Land Tax, at the price of Consols at the date of the Act, would have purchased about £70,000,000 of Consols. The redemption, however, had not taken place, and Consols are now above par. But under the present Bill the purchase money must still be applied in the manner directed by the Redemption Act. Each £100 of tax must therefore be invested in Consols, which were now 116, and the premium must be paid for by the general Exchequer out of the funds contributed by general taxation, and the landowner who redeemed could thereby obtain, in addition to his rebate of relief of tax, the capital sum which the premium represented. In other words, the Government would take up the tax on the 3 per cent., or 30 years' tables, in order to lend it out at under £2 15s. This was clearly improvident. If the clause had gone on to provide that the purchase money need not necessarily be invested in the manner now directed by the Act, there would have been an answer, but otherwise there was no answer to the argument on which the Amendment was based, and he therefore supported it, particularly as he objected to this further dole or sum represented by the premium being given to the landowner, as well as his rebate in respect of the tax.

said that if this clause was passed with 30 years' purchase, anyone who was paying £100 a year of Land Tax might come to the Treasury and compel redemption. The Treasury were now getting £100 a year, but instead of continuing to receive that amount they would in future get £3,000 from the person who compelled redemp- tion. The Treasury would be obliged to go into the open market with that £3,000 and buy stock with it.

I must remind the hon. Member that that case has been put over and over again.

The question has never been answered from this standpoint, because it has never been put.

The same argument has been used, and the hon. Gentleman is not entitled to repeat arguments which have been urged over and over again. He is not justified in occupying the time of the Committee by merely repeating arguments with which they are already familiar.

had not heard the question put from the standpoint he desired to present. He wished to make clear the process which necessarily took place. If they went to the market and bought they would buy at a loss of £23 10s. for every £100. Why should they throw £23 10s. away——

Under the Standing Order 24, I consider the hon. Member is repeating the arguments of other hon. Members, and I must ask him to resume his seat.

said the hon. Member might have placed this Amendment on the Paper. [Cheers.] He did not see why the system at present in force should be changed. Payments could be made now either in single sums or instalments, and he did not see on what ground the system was to be altered.

said the reason was that the terms were more liberal than any that had been offered before.

No; the terms offered in 1853 were more liberal than those now proposed.

said they were not more liberal, because the rate of interest was much higher then than now. All the difference was made by the fact that money was now 2 per cent. By the terms offered, the taxpayers were to lose between £300,000 and £400,000. And not only that, but the matter was taken out of the hands of Parliament, because the instalments were to be paid upon such terms as might be agreed upon between the Treasury and the landowner. It was thus left to the Treasury to come to terms with individual landowners. There was too much of such legislation by Departmental regulation. The way the clause was drafted was highly objectionable.

said he wished to meet every reasonable objection that could be raised. Hon. Members seemed to be under an impression that the Treasury would be a great loser by the clause. That was not his opinion at all. He believed there would be very few cases wherein the Land Tax amounted to a considerable sum in which the 30 years' terms would be accepted. The cases in which they might be accepted were cases in which the Land Tax was a very small amount indeed—perhaps a fraction of a penny in the pound on the valuation, involving the payment of a few shillings. In such cases persons might be disposed to redeem on the 30 years' basis.

said he did not think the Chancellor of the Exchequer had quite met the point the hon. Member for the Flint Boroughs had in view in moving the Amendment. The hon. Member objected to payment by instalments and to any credit being given. If the Land Tax payer could obtain advantageous terms by agreement with the Commissioners, why should credit be given to him?

said the Treasury were not bound to accept payment by instalments, for under the clause as it stood they could decline to do so. ["Hear, hear!"]

said that if payment by instalments were permitted it might give the landowner power to hold over payment to any extent.

suggested that words should be inserted in the clause limiting the number of instalments, say to 10 or 15. As the clause stood the Treasury Commissioners had the power of fixing any number of instalments they pleased.

said he would inquire what the practice was before Report and see whether it was advisable to insert some limitation.

said the object of the words was to make provision for the payment of outstanding amounts.

pointed out that under the words payments might stand over for 20, 30, 50 or even 100 years.

said the intention was that a person owing instalments might pay them at any time. The words did not mean that the payments might stand over for ever.

suggested that words should be inserted to the effect that a certain time should not be exceeded.

thought such an Amendment was quite unnecessary.

asked if it would be open to the Treasury to give an indulgence to a man who had not paid.

remarked that the words of the clause did not add to the power of the Treasury.

Does the hon. Gentleman press the Amendment?

Yes.

said that his hostility to this new clause was not abated by the fact that the right hon. Gentleman had changed the duty from 2d. to 1d. If the principle was wrong with regard to 2d. it was equally wrong with regard to 1d. He regretted that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had not given the Committee a fuller explanation of the reason for this duty. Very few persons seemed to know what butter was, where the cocoa ended and the butter began. He believed that there was a tax on cocoa in this country because it was a drink which might compete with tea or coffee; but cocoa butter was not a drink and could not be used as such. [Ironical laughter.] There was, therefore, no principle on which they ought to tax this product in this country. Cocoa butter was a by-product obtained from cocoa, and he believed it was used in the manufacture of confectionery, and to a large extent it took the place of sugar. He believed it was also used for the hair—(laughter)—and the manufacture of medicines. It had been suggested that the object of the proposed duty was to protect British trade.

I said it was to avoid protecting anybody.

said that was exactly the same thing. It struck at the root of the fiscal system of this country. It was contrary to the principle of Free Trade to impose duties on articles where it could be asserted that foreigners benefited by the admission of these articles duty free. Hon. Gentlemen who had any belief in the principle of Free Trade should resist this subtle attack on that principle. They were not by this proposal taxing the foreigner, but the English consumer. So far as he could make out, about 100 tons of cocoa butter were imported into this country, and the duty would amount to about £900. It could not, therefore, be said that the proposal was made in the interest of the Exchequer. He believed it was made in the interest of the firm of Cadbury, who would probably get about £9,000 as a result of this duty. Referring to a paper circulated to Members on the subject, he said it contained the statement that if English makers were to establish works in Holland they could import the whole of the butter extracted into England, whereas if they made it in England, duty would have to be paid on it. That was not a full statement of case, because importers had to pay 2d. a pound duty when they sent to England a commodity which produced 50 per cent. powder and 50 per cent. butter, while the English manufacturer paid a penny on all. He could not see that the foreigner got any advantage at all. The next statement that was made was that there was an import duty on the butter in France and America, but these were both Pro- tectionist countries, whereas we were a Free Trade country. In reference to the next statement he pointed out that probably not more than one-fifth of the cocoa butter was imported into England. What they wanted was the broad principle. In the first place, the foreigner had no advantage; in the second place, the proposal was against our whole fiscal policy; and in the third place they ought not hastily in that Committee to adopt anything which was contrary to that policy.

said he had not attempted in this matter to do anything contrary to the fiscal policy of the country. Since the last statement which he made to the House on the subject he had put himself in communication with Messrs. Fry and other firms who had objected to the duty, and he had now their authority to say they agreed to the imposition of a penny duty—["Hear, hear!"]—and they did so on the following grounds. Raw cocoa, as the Committee was aware, paid a duty of a penny a pound upon importation into this country, and any manufacture of cocoa, other than cocoa butter, paid a duty of 2d. Cocoa butter, for some mysterious reason, was not considered by those whoso duty it was to interpret the law as coming within the terms of a "manufacture of cocoa" in the existing Act. There was reason to believe that its importation was likely considerably to increase. Out of 86 pounds of marketable produce, the manufacturer would get, he was informed, 50 pounds of cocoa butter, and if there was no duty proposed on the importation of cocoa butter into England it would be sent here by the foreign manufacturer free of duty, while the English manufacturer would have to pay duty. It was a very small matter, but he thought that it was unfair, and they had therefore brought forward this clause.

thought the right hon. Gentleman had to a large extent met the objections which had been urged. It was true that there was nearly 50 per cent. of cocoa butter in the cocoa bean, but as a matter of fact, by means of high pressure they could only take away about 30 or 35 per cent. of it. By extracting the cocoa butter they made a lighter and more wholesome beverage. Messrs. Fry & Co. used the cocoa butter for the purpose of producing confections which they could not do without cocoa butter and cheap sugar. The consequence was that, under the present law, they were enabled to cut out the French and German confections, which were handicapped by the expensive sugar which they had to use. If the Government were going to protect the cocoa manufacturers, they ought to go a step further and protect our other industries from foreign competition.

asked for some explanation of the clause.

was understood to say that impartial duties with regard to the examination and conduct of solicitors were imposed by law upon the Incorporated Law Society, and it was found that the funds of that body were not sufficient for the purpose. The society had placed their case before him, and asked that a small portion of the duty should he allocated for the purpose under the supervision of the Treasury, and that was the object of the clause.

said he could not allow the clause to pass without a protest. This was another instance of the interception of taxes and their diversion before reaching the Treasury. The clause proposed that 7s. 6d. on each solicitor's certificate should be paid to the Incorporated Law Society instead of into the Exchequer. It appeared that a solicitor paid £9 for taking out his certificate, and part of that money was to be used for striking him off the rolls should occasion arise. He was to be struck off the rolls with his own money.

"Keen was the pang, but, keener still, to feel,

His own the pinion that impelled the steel."

[Laughter.] The Law Society was an extremely respectable trade union, and it exercised very useful judicial functions; but those functions were exercised in the interest of lawyers in order to keep their own house clean, and they ought to pay for the cleaning of their own house. If they were to get this public money at all they should get it in the proper way—by a grant-in-aid. He was anxious not to speak more than was necessary on this Bill, because he desired to see it passed; but it was impossible for him, holding the very strong opinions he did with regard to the interception of the public revenue, to allow the clause to pass without protest.

hoped the Chancellor of the Exchequer would not press the clause. If a proposal of this kind was to be made, it ought to be made in the Bill. The Law Society was no doubt a very useful body, but it was in the interest of the solicitors themselves that these inquiries were held. He could not understand the principle of giving money to this society any more than to the Inns of Court, in respect of any proceedings they might have to take against barristers. He really thought that at that time of night no new subject for discussion should be introduced beyond those which were absolutely necessary for the purposes of the Government. This clause could very well be brought up another year for discussion, and he hoped the right hon. Gentleman would not press it now.

said he made the proposal in the innocence of his heart, on the precedent of a very similar provision with regard to the King's Inn in Dublin. He thought a similar grant might be made in this case for duties which were eminently useful, which were imposed by statute on this society, and for which their funds were not sufficient. However, he admitted the force of the right hon. Gentleman's objections, and as he was most anxious to facilitate the discussion, he would not press the clause.

explained that the clause provided for an increase of annuity of £65,000 a year. Without this increase the Fund would be bankrupt in the course of the coming year.

explained why the clause had no application to burghs, and that it was not necessary to construe "land tax parish" as "burgh."

said this clause seemed to have no relation to finance, and he did not know how it got here.

said the clause was simply to do away with an unfortunate omission in the Finance Act of 1894, which, as it at present stood, worked a great injustice in Scotland. The Leader of the Opposition would remember that, in Clause 18 of the Finance Act of 1894, he made this change in the succession duty—that the value for the purpose of succession duty on real property was, in the case of a successor who was competent to dispose, made the total value instead of the value of his interest, as had been the law before. As the Bill was originally drafted, entailed property in Scotland was not included amongst the settled property, and a definition clause was put in that an heir of entail in possession should be held to be a person who was competent to dispose. He put down certain amendments to that, and pointed out to the right hon. Gentleman, the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, that it really inflicted a great injustice to all entail proprietors in Scotland, because they practically only had the same amount of possession of their property as a life owner in England had. The right hon. Gentleman felt the force of that argument, and candidly said he would consider the matter on report. He accordingly produced a certain clause on Report, but instead of taking his words as they stood, which simply said the heir of entail should be considered as the possessor of settled property, the clause proceeded to say in positive words that he should have exactly the same privileges—that he should not have to pay the full duty, unless he was a person who was entitled to disentail without consent. They omitted to notice that, through the form of expression being altered, that did not touch the succession of the Succession Duty Clauses which had already been passed before they came to the Amendment. The consequence of that was now, under the Succession Duty Clauses, taken with the interpretation clause, the value for the purpose of succession duty was taken to be the principal value of the property. If they had three brothers in England who succeeded one after the other, they only, for the purposes of the Succession Duty, paid upon what they got, namely, the life interest. In Scotland, where their position was really actually the same, they would have to pay upon the whole principal value of the property.

remarked that the clause in the Finance Act of 1894 was very carefully considered, not only in the House, but behind the Speaker's chair, in consultations between both sides of the House, with reference to the qualities which should be attached to the succession of heirs of entail. He complained that if there was to be something in the nature of an alteration of the law of this complicated succession they ought to have had it in the Bill, more particularly if the clause was to be a substantial repeal of a matter which had been expressly and definitely arranged between both sides of the House. He demurred to the view that in Scotland they treated heirs of entail in the same fashion as in England. Heirs of entail in Scotland were by law and in the sense of the matter heritable proprietors, and had been so treated with regard to their rights.