mines and quarries.1 There are various statutory limits of rating for these purposes which somewhat restrict the powers of urban authorities to undertake costly improvements.2

The administration of the Poor Law Acts throughout Scotland, and of the Registration of Births, etc., Acts and Burial Grounds Act in rural parishes, is entrusted to parochial boards, who levy the rates required for these purposes. Prior to 1890 they also administered the Public Health Acts in rural districts and levied the necessary rate; but this department has now been transferred to the county councils.3 Elementary education is in the charge of parish and burgh school boards created in 1872, but the school rate is raised by the parochial boards. For poor-law purposes the limits of the old civil parishes, 885 in number, are still adhered to; but there have been subdivisions for church and educational purposes. There is nothing in Scotland corresponding to the English poor-law unions and boards of guardians, the administration of the poor laws being wholly parochial.

The poor-relief system of Scotland appears to have remained upon a voluntary basis down to 1845, and, till then, to have resembled that abandoned in England in 1601. It dated from the latter part of the sixteenth century, and was probably called into existence by the dissolution of the monasteries, as was the case in England. The system of general parish assessments, introduced by the act of 1845, was followed by a rapid increase of expenditure, as the following figures will show:5

8 In burghs, the acts relating to registration of births, etc., burial grounds and public health are administered by town councils.

4 Goudy and Smith, pp. 5 and 45; Local Government and Taxation in Scotland, by W. Macdonald, Cobden Club Essays, 1882, pp. 407-409.

5 Report of Board of Supervision, 1891-92.

But this system is not universally in operation, there being still forty-six parishes in which the old voluntary system, modified and reformed, is permitted to continue by the board of supervision. There are thirteen other parishes in which poor relief assessments are levied upon an old plan which was in partial use before 1845, known as assessment by established

usage.

An interesting experiment in taxation was worked out in connection with the Scottish Poor Law of 1845. The poor rate was laid in equal shares on the owners and occupiers of the ratable property in each parish; but the parochial boards were authorized to levy the occupiers' moiety in either of three ways, one of which was by an assessment of "means and substance." No precise definitions of this term were laid down, and it fell out that an English judge was assessed upon his full salary in aid of the poor rate of a parish in Scotland in which he happened to have a residence. This was simply a glaring instance of the general inconvenience and injustice of the method, which was found to be rapidly depopulating some of the parishes to which it was at first applied, and was before long wholly abandoned.1

Another experiment, having a similar end in view, has met with greater acceptance. This consisted of the classification of occupiers for their share of the poor rate according to the nature of the occupancy. Three categories were usually adopted (1) private residences, (2) shops and business

1 McNeel-Caird, Cobden Club Essays, 1875, p. 156. See, also, evidence given before the Local Taxation Committee of 1870 by Mr. Cochran, Q. 322; Sir J. Lambert, Q. 2339 and 2352; and Sir J. Caird, Q. 4357-4359. Also Burdens on Land Report, 1846, pp. 598 and 603.

premises, and (3) farms. The rent or annual value was taken as a basis in each case; but the rates in the pound varied in the proportions of three, two and one, or four, two and one, respectively.1 This plan is still in operation in 174 parishes. It is, of course, inapplicable to parishes consisting chiefly of holdings of one class; but for parishes of mixed character there appears to be much to be said for it, both from the point of view of abstract justice and from that of conformity with the laws of ultimate incidence. "Classification" does not apply to the owners' half-share.

The total revenue of the parochial boards in 1890-91 (exclusive of loans) was £1,498,368; and from loans, £9,520. The chief items were:

The loans outstanding at the end of the year amounted to £364,175. The gross rental of assessed parishes was £23,630,277; of unassessed parishes, £294,605; and of the whole of Scotland, £23,924,882.

The history of highway and main-road legislation in Scotland closely resembles that of England, the same expedients of repair by the inhabitants, statute labor, turnpike tolls, rates and government subventions having been in turn resorted to in each case.2 Turnpike tolls were abolished in 1883, and the cost is now wholly borne by the rates, except so far as these are relieved by the allocated taxes, as in England.

1 Goudy and Smith, p. 46; Macdonald, Cobden Club Essays, 1882, pp. 412-413; Cochran's evidence, 1870, Q. 325, et seq.

2 Goudy and Smith, p. 75 et seq.

An old and peculiar feature of Scottish local finance is the taxation of real property for ecclesiastical purposes. The assessments are made and the moneys expended by the "heritors of parishes." Their rates for 1890-91 produced £39,494, of which £11,510 were spent on churches and £17,080 on manses (parsonages). The rates fall wholly on the owners.

The sum paid to the Scottish local taxation account in the year 1891-92, from the produce of the allocated taxes, was £795,712, as shown in Part I, Chapter V. In 1890-91 the amount was £730,988, and the disposition of this sum is set forth in detail in Table XIV of the Appendix.2 In addition to the relief of local taxation thus afforded, further assistance is given by way of grants out of the consolidated fund and charges borne by Parliamentary votes. It is difficult to determine which of these grants and charges are wholly or partly local in character, no official list or statement being obtainable. Some figures are, however, appended in Table XVI, in which the lines adopted in the English return (see Table IX, Part I) have been followed as far as possible.

Two matters in respect of which the Scottish system differs from that of England are the existence of a well-made valuation roll for all local purposes, and the very large extent to which the rates are charged directly upon the owners. Prior to 1854, the county assessments were based upon valuations two hundred years old, but in that year an act was passed requiring the county and burgh authorities, respectively, to make up a valuation roll annually, and to base their future assessments upon it. A uniform basis of assessment is thus provided for the whole country, which, in practice, has given very general satisfaction. In a large number of counties and burghs the

1 Goudy and Smith, pp. 5 and 61.

2 Similar official returns for England and Ireland would be both interesting and useful, but none have yet been issued.

3 McNeel-Caird, 1875, p. 119.

4 Goudy and Smith, p. 89. The values entered in these rolls are similar to those known in England as "gross estimated rental." For poor rate and school rate purposes, deductions are made which furnish a net valuation, similar to the English "ratable value." These deductions vary according to local usage.

services of the surveyors of taxes have been utilized in the preparation of the rolls, under an arrangement with the board of inland revenue; and the valuations made by them are accepted by the crown for the assessment of imperial taxes, as in London under the Metropolis Valuation Act. The general rules for estimating the value of property correspond closely to those theoretically in operation in England; but an exception exists in a provision that lands let on lease for periods not exceeding twenty-one years, at a yearly rent and without any other consideration, are to be assessed on the rent, regardless of any improvements effected during the currency of the lease. The act of 1854 further provides that in the case of leases for more than twenty-one years, the lessee is deemed to be the owner, but is empowered to deduct from the rent or ground rent so much of the rates as corresponds to the proportion which the rent or ground rent bears to the total valuation.1 The duty of preparing the valuation roll in royal and Parliamentary burghs is cast on the magistrates of such burghs; elsewhere, on the county councils. The cost is borne in equal proportions by occupiers and owners.

The division of certain of the rates between occupiers and owners extends, in some cases, to the making of separate assessments on the respective persons of each class, and the separate collection of the respective quotas from those persons or their agents.2 In other cases the rates are first paid by the occupiers, and the owners' proportion is deducted from the rent.3 The apportionment of rates between these classes and the amounts borne by each are set out in detail in Table XV of the Appendix.4

Under the act of 1889, county rates for new purposes and increases in the old ones beyond the average of the previous

1 McNeel-Caird, p. 120.

2 See evidence given before the Local Taxation Committee, 1870, Q. 320, 4132-3 and 4335-6.

8 Goudy and Smith, pp. 22 and 30.

4 Sir J. Caird stated in evidence before Mr. Goschen's committee of 1870 that prior to 1845 the Scottish rates were borne wholly by the owners. The occupiers were, however, liable to provide labor for the repair of the roads, and were also expected to relieve the poor who subsisted by begging. Q. 4131 and 4134.