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the fact that they were an administrative was
body placed outside the jurisdiction of
the courts by an express Act of Par-
liament, they were in his opinion unfit
for the position they held.

*MR. ATKINSON: I can ease the hon. Gentleman's mind upon that point, the Estates Commissioners never asked for an opinion of any kind, are not entitled to ask it, and, as far as I am concerned, would never get it.

MR. CLANCY said that was a most gratifying statement. Could the hon. Member make such another with regard to the man in the iron mask? Of course, he did not think that Mr. Finucane or Mr. Bayley would be guilty of any such ridiculous action. If he were to express an opinion he would say it was the Treasury, and he would go further and say he believed he could put his finger on the man who represented the Treasury on that occasion. If he repeated the rumours in Dublin he would say the Secretary of the Commission, Sir John Franks, was the agent on this occasion. If the hon. and learned Gentlemen could not answer the question himself would he ask the Chief Secretary to tell the House whether it was the habit of this Mr. Franks, who had been lately knighted, to issue these ukases to a Board which he had no right to address so long as they acted within the lines of their Department. There was one other point upon which he would like information-Why were these Amendments necessary to every Act of Parliament passed for Ireland? There had already been six amending Acts to the Local Government Board Act of 1898. The real reason was that all British Governments distrusted the Irish Members; they looked with suspicion on every proposal made by them, and, as a consequence, when the most necessary suggestion was made by them during the progress of an Irish Bill through Parliament, the Government attitude became at once antagonistic; the suggestion was disregarded, and, as a result, in a few years the Act had to be amended. It was nothing less than insulting to the Irish representatives, the manner in which the Government always imputed to them sinister motives.

*MR. HEMPHILL (Tyrone, N.) said he could not help thinking the House

much indebted to Mr. Justice Ross for having expressed, in the form of a judgment, an opinion on the construction of the Land Act of 1903, because it had brought to the attention of the House and the country the necessity for the amendment of this Act as to the bonus. The whole matter had been dis cussed over and over again when the Act was before the House, and the right hon. Gentleman had stated he was not prepared to sanction compulsion, but thought some method of suasion such as the granting of a bonus would carry out the intentions of the Act. Mr. Justice Ross had, however, given a contrary opinion, and, that being so, the whole case ought to be reopened. He rose to ask the right hon. Gentleman and his advisers whether this amending Bill should not be framed so as to include the discussion of the other great questions involved in this Amendment, so that further amending Bills would be avoided in the future. He thought the opportunity ought to be offered, and trusted it would be offered to the House to see whether the system of zones could not be got rid of altogether. The existence of these zones would always be a great disadvantage in the working of the Act, because they had held out inducements to the landlords to insist on a price quite beyond the market price of land in Ireland. He trusted, when this amending Bill came before the House for discussion, a clause would be inserted requiring that, in every case

where the landlord and tenant could not

agree at once as to the price to be paid, there should be an immediate inspection. of the land, and that the price should be fixed by the Estates Commissioners.

on the

The letter referred to by the hon. Mem ber for South Tyrone was most valuable as showing what was passing in the minds of the landlords. The English taxpayer was interested in this question, because Parliament had pledged British credit to the extent of £100,000,000 security of purchase annuities, and had also given £12,000,000 hard cash as a bonus. Consequently the English taxpayer was vitally interested in seeing that these annuities were not unreasonably high. If a tenant bought at thirty years purchase, and was liable to pay 31 per cent. on the purchase money, he would have imposed upon him

a burden which, in a bad season, or even in an average season, would render it impossible for him to meet his engagement to the State. The State would be the sufferer in the last resort. It was there fore most essential, not only for the character of the Irish people themselves, but for the prosperity of the country, and for the preservation of the country to the occupiers of the land as tillers of the soil, that they should get the land at such a reasonable price as would enable them to make an honest living from their labour; but that would be altogether impossible if the landlords were encour aged to place an undue price upon the land, or to take advantage of the ignor ance, weakness, or anxiety of the tenant to impose upon him a burden which the land would not sustain. This could be guarded against only by having, as had been done under previous Acts, an inspection by a responsible officer who would make sure that the price asked was such as the tenant might reasonably be required to pay. By purchasing his holding a tenant incurred an invariable liability for sixtyeight and a half years-a liability which he could not escape from or modify, no matter how bad the seasons might be or what untoward circumstances might arise. All these considerations should be borne in mind in order that the tenants might have every possible safeguard the Legislature could create to prevent them rushing into improvident and unfortunate bargains. The state of Ireland would be worse then ever if the unfortunate occupiers were to be burdened by an exorbitant rent which they could not pay. It would end either in a revolution or in universal bankruptcy. It was therefore absolutely necessary that the right hon. Gentleman should consider, in bringing in his amending Bill, whether he would not modify the section with regard to the zones and require some such security as had been suggested.

With regard to the congested districts, one of the great objects of the Act being to relieve the congestion, it would be preposterous if the measure wholly failed in that respect. There were landlords who had fine grazing lands on their hands and a number of tenants paying up to £10 a year. They would be extremely glad to sell the mountainous parts of their estates at twenty-three or twenty-four years purchase, pocket the bonus, and Mr. Hemphill.

retain the large grass pasture lands in their hands. That would be a glorious thing for the landlords, but it was not the object for which the British Parliament had guaranteed £100,000,000 and made a present of £12,000,000. That these uneconomic holdings should be converted into fee simples at the end of sixty-eight or seventy years would be a thing at which the gods might laugh as a spectacle of absurdity and incongruity. The only way to keep these honest, decent, struggling, poor people in the land of their birth was to give them an opportunity of enlarging their farms to a living margin, and that could be done only by making the landlords who had large untenanted lands, sell the whole, so that the Estates Commissioners might parcel out and resettle the estates in such a way as to give each tenant a reasonable holding. Unless the Act were amended in the manner foreshadowed by the Motion before the House it would be a mockery, a delusion, and a snare, both to the people of Ireland and to the taxpayers of this country. The experience of the year had confirmed him in the opinion that finality was remote and that they were only in the process of evolution in the settlement of the land question, and that compulsion was the ultimate resort to which the House must at no very distant date have recourse, if the evils of which they complained were to be remedied. Meanwhile, he appealed to right hon. Gentlemen to carry out the resolution of the Congested Districts Board of 1895, for unless compulsory powers were granted to the Board the Act would be a failure, and in the meanwhile he should vote for this Motion,

MR. COGHILL (Stoke-upon-Trent) reminded the House that last session he was one of the small minority who opposed the passing of the Land Act, and if he required any justification or vindication of the attitude he then took up it would be found in the speeches to which they had listened in the course of the debate. Only seven months had elapsed since the Act passed through the House. What had become of all the hopes and expectations that were then held out? Every prediction which the minority made, had been borne out by the facts. The hon. Member for North Leitrim had declared that the

Chief Secretary had not closed the door | Even so far as the land question went on the Irish land question. But last they were now told that the Act could year the right hon. Gentleman said that not be regarded as a solution of this he was closing the door for all time, and question. The Chief Secretary had it was in that belief to a great extent stated, by the way of consolation for havthat Members on the Government side of ing spent these £12,000,000 and guaranthe House supported the Bill. What had teed a further £100,000,000, that the House been the effect of the measure on the had the satisfaction of knowing that they price of land in Ireland? Previously the had done their duty. Perhaps they had, price was seventeen and a half years but was it not rather an expensive way of purchase; it had now gone up to twenty- doing their duty? He only hoped that if five or thirty years, and the hon. Member the right hon. Gentleman on some future opposite had gone the length of saying occasion wanted them to do their duty he that Ireland would have been better off would ask them to do it at a somewhat without the Act unless it were amended. He had heard of an estate the landlord lower figure. In a recent speech the Chief of which had always received his rents Secretary had said that Ireland was enpunctually and without reduction, titled to perfect equality of treatment with and who had now obtained he did England. He had always been prepared not know how many years purchase to grant that, but he had always understood for it and a bonus of £240,000 in addition. that Ireland enjoyed an excessive repreWhat did the British taxpayer get in sentation in the House of Commons, return for that? Absolutely nothing. and that if there was any inequality Surely that was not a profitable bargain it was against the British rather for the people of this country. Reference than the Irish people. They now had been made to the congested districts wanted the Act amended. Last session and the evicted tenants, and it appeared he had urged the House not to pass that those questions were in the same acute the Act because, if they did, the Irish stage as before the Act was passed. Members would be masters of the situaFurther, the hon. Member had spoken of tion. His view was not accepted, and all the free gift of £12,000,000 as a mere he would say to the Irish Members now waste of public money. He sincerely was that they had the matter in their hoped the British taxpayer would take own hands, and could get what they note of those words. liked from the Chief Secretary. Before the Act was passed the British Members were masters of the situation. That was the case no longer, and hon. Gentlemen opposite could get what they liked. If the Act had been a success and had removed the grievances complained of he and his friends would have felt that their opposition had been unjustified, but in the light of what had taken place he could only say that their action had been entirely vindicated. He did not wish to rake up any further controversy; he would therefore merely add that it must now be recognised-he thought the right hon. Gentleman himself must now recognise it-that the solution of the Irish land question would have to remain for some other Irish Secretary who was sanguine, less visionary, less enthusiastic, but perhaps more practical, than the present occupant of that office.

the war.

The opposition to the measure was based mainly on three grounds. The first was that the moment for making the demand was inopportune owing to the great strain of The present price of Consols showed that the opposition on that point was fully justified. The second ground of opposition was that the demand was not a final one, and that before long the Irish Members would come back wanting further legislation. On that ground also the opposition had been absolutely justified. The third ground of opposition was that the measure would not afford a final solution and that it would not be considered asa final settlement of the questions between this country and Ireland. The hon. Member for Waterford had always fairly and honestly taken up that position, but the same could not be said of the Chief Secretary, for the right hon. Gentleman had led the House to believe that they were approaching the period of the millenium. so far as the Irish question was concerned. All that had now disappeared.

less

MR. THOMAS O'DONNELL (Kerry, W.) expressed the hope that the Chief Secretary would be of the same opinion as

even

the hon. Member who had just spoken, with regard to the Irish Members getting the Act amended in the direction they desired. He believed that the Chief Secretary had done his best, as far as he was allowed, to remedy the great evils connected with the land question in Ireland, but, if they came to the House to ask for the amendment of the Act of last year, they did so because they knew Ireland better than the right hon. Gentleman. The Irish tenants desired to give the fullest facilities for the working of the Act. The Irish Party as a whole did everything in their power to facilitate the passing of the measure through the House, and, when they went home to their own country, they encouraged the tenants to give prices above what they had been accustomed to give in order to show that they were serious in their desire to bring

about a settlement of the Irish land

ques

tion. Last year they were told, when the Act was being passed, that it would help to divide up the grazing ranches in Connaught among those who lived on the bogs and the mountains. They were told that the evicted tenants who had been suffering on the roadside for twenty or twenty-five years, would be restored to their holdings. Those who believed in compulsory purchase for the time being waived their plea for the enactment of powers to bring that about, in order to give the policy embodied in the Act an opportunity of being tried. They had done everything they could to facilitate the policy. Had the landlords of Ireland striven honourably to facilitate the work of transferring the land to the people, and so to promote the pacification of the country? It was evident to every man who had watched the course of events during the last six months that, instead of facilitating the work, they had done everything in their power to oppose it. During the past seventeen years while land purchase had been in operation, the average price in the congested portions of the country, where the land was poor, was thirteen and a quarter years purchase. In his own county, which was more than half congested, the average price was fifteen and a half years purchase. The hon. Member for South Tyrone had quoted the highest prices in those districts under the old Act, and he thought the figures must have surprised hon. Members who heard them. He would give the Mr. Thomas O'Donnell.

prices for his own district. Lord Lansdowne, Lord Barrymore, and a number of other landlords had sold their estates in Kerry at prices ranging from eleven to nineteen years purchase, the average being fifteen and a half years. These men got no bonus, and they had to pay the expenses of transfer. They had to accept payment in reduced land stock instead of cash. Tenants who lived next door to the men who had already purchased had approached their landlords asking them to sell. Lord Lansdowne, whose highest price for his best land wa nineteen years purchase under the old Act, was now demanding twenty-five years purchase with the bonus under last year's Act. Lord Kenmare had demanded something like the same price. He could give numerous examples of the same kind of demand made by landlords. In the face of these facts how could it be said that they had met the tenants or their representatives fairly in this matter. He said they had not, and if this Act was failing or breaking down it was not the fault of the Irish tenants, who had increased the market value of the land. It lay with the landlords who had insisted on demanding from the tenants prices which were economically unfair. The transactions which had taken place under the Land Act should have fixed the price that might be considered the fair market value of the land. That price averaged seventeen years purchase on the rentals.

It might be said that there was not a fair field in Ireland, and that the system of arriving at the market value was not the same as in other countries that supply and demand did not work as in other countries. From the Report of the Agricultural Commission in 1897, it appeared that one of the most eminent authorities in this country--Sir Robert Giffen-said that it was almost impossible for the landlords of England to get eighteen years purchase on the then rentals, though in 1875 it was possible to get thirty years purchase on the then rentals. Though these rentals had been reduced in the intervening twenty years, it was almost impossible to get eighteen years purchase. In Ireland the landlords wanted twentyfive, twenty-eight, and thirty years purchase for the land, but if eighteen years purchase was sufficient for English

land, with the great facilities for sending produce to market and other advantages which farmers here had over those in Ireland, it was monstrous for any Irish landlord to ask thirty years purchase. He spoke for his own constituency when he said that, if the demand was continued, they would insist on putting a period to this hypocritical form of conciliation. The hon. Member, referring to the prices within the zones, said it was natural that when the Government said they regarded twenty-seven and a half years purchase as full and sufficient security, the landlords should go in for the highest figure the Governmient were prepared to accept. The Government were responsible for the raising of prices. Until that system was done away with, the landlords would continue to demand prices which it would be impossible to pay, and the final settlement of the Irish land question would be postponed. The hon. Member for South Tyrone, speaking for Ulster, said he would be content with the mean of the zones. Speaking for Munster, he himself would not be satisfied with that mean. What was meant by cheap money? Was it cheap if the interest paid for his money by the farmer was not lower than the interest paid under the Act of 1896? He contended that when all the Treasury arrangements were unravelled it would be found that money was as dear under the present Act as under the old Acts of 1891 and 1896. It was said that the landlords were entitled to have their present net income. What they were now asking was an amount of purchase money for their estates which, invested in absolutely safe securities, would bring in 4 per cent., although trustees securities at the time of the Land Conference did not bring in a rate of interest of 33 per cent. He found from the report of the Agricultural Commission that the English and Scotch landlords only received CO per cent. of their gross rental, whereas the Irish landlords now demanded 90 per cent.

*MR. O'DOWD (Sligo, S.) said that as he came from a constituency which would be more or less affected by the Amendment, he would hardly be doing his duty if he did not give his opinion of the case presented to the House by his hon. friend the Member for North Leitrim, and of the causes which had tended to render

the Act of last year to a great extent a failure. That Act, if it was ever to be a success, especially in Connaught, could only become so by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary accepting the recommendations contained in the Amendment now before the House. That was his opinion and that was the opinion of those competent to judge by the fullest knowledge and experience of the working of the Act. He spoke from personal knowledge of facts in his own constituency, when he said that the Act since it came into operation had been handicapped, and rendered practically inoperative, by the unreasonable attitude taken up by the great body of landlords from the first. They had refused to sell, at even any price, through the Estates Commissioners; and they had refused to sell to the tenants direct unless at prices which it would be absolutely impossible for them to pay. They refused to sell outside the zones, ignoring altogether the broad basis of years purchase on which the tenants were accustomed to buy their holdings under the Ashbourne and other Acts in the past. He knew landlords in his own county of Sligo who two years ago would have willingly sold their estates at twenty years purchase on second-term rentals. To-day these same gentlemen were demanding prices which, with the bonus added, would mean thirty years purchase. Now, he respectfully asked, what had occurred in the meantime to enhance the value of land in Ireland? Nothing, in his humble judgment. On the contrary, land had depreciated in value in Ireland during the last two years, as anyone knew who had any experience of rural life in that country. Everyone would agree that the year 1903 had been one of the most disastrous which farmers in Ireland had experienced for a quarter of a century.

And, it being half-past Seven of the clock, the debate stood adjourned till this Evening's Sitting.

EVENING SITTING.

KING'S SPEECH (MOTION FOR AN ADDRESS).

Order read, for resuming adjourned debate on Amendment [18th February] to Main Question [2nd February], "That

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