It is interesting to learn from Mr. Fowler's report that of the present total local debt £183,915,189 is owing by purely urban authorities, £13,393,410 by authorities partly urban and partly rural, and only £3,906,859 by purely rural authorities. From other detailed figures in that report we are enabled to deduce the fact that the bulk of the debt is, indeed, the outcome of a great development of municipal or other public enterprise in recent years, chiefly in the metropolis and the provincial boroughs. This spirit of enterprise is displayed, in a manner equally significant, both in the commercial undertakings from which profits may be looked for, and in those departments which are a recognition of unremunerative public duties. The total debt is almost equally divided between the two classes, and the portion applicable to the latter class will be seen to fall mainly under the heads of sanitation, education and public improvements. When it is remembered that the present generation is not only paying the interest but also repaying a large part of the principal of these loans, the determination of a self-governing people to incur the cost is an evidence of the development of public spirit in a highly admirable degree.

The aid of the national government in the raising of loans has been more or less available by the local authorities since 1792, when special acts of Parliament were passed authorizing loans by the Treasury for local purposes. In 1817 a body called the Public Works Loans Commissioners was constituted by statute for the regular consideration and grant of applications for loans for local public works of certain specified descriptions, and large sums have been advanced by the Treasury on their advice. But owing to the acceptance of as little as three per cent interest, and of insufficient security in certain cases, considerable losses have been sustained. Since 1876, the rates of interest have been advanced; and in 1887 a local loans stock was created, by which the advances of the government to the local authorities were distinguished from the remainder of the national debt. Up to that time £106,000,000 had, in all, been advanced throughout the United Kingdom; of which £57,200,000 had

been repaid, £11,600,000 remitted as bad debts, and £37,200,ooo remained outstanding. The bulk of the existing local debt has been borrowed from private individuals under local acts of Parliament, and in the open market under the Local Loans Act of 1875. The periods formerly allowed for the repayment of local debt were often excessively long, extending in one case to 110 years; but recently a much greater degree of strictness has been exercised by Parliament and the government departments in requiring more rapid repayment of all fresh loans. On the whole, whilst the magnitude of the total local debt and of the sacrifices imposed by it upon the ratepayers is sufficiently serious, there is no ground for alarm. The very large present sacrifice entailed under the system of comparatively rapid repayment is in itself both a salutary check upon extravagance, and a guarantee of solvency which is likely to become increasingly operative as time goes on. The bulk of the present local debt is held at rates of interest ranging from three to three and one-half per cent, and is regarded by lenders as a secure investment.

CHAPTER III. Rates: Valuation, Assessment and Levy.

The local rates of all kinds are (with certain exceptions which will be referred to subsequently) charged to the individual ratepayers in the form of taxes, calculated uniformly at so much in the pound on the "ratable value" of the premises or property occupied by them as will raise the required amount. Thus, if £1,000 be required in a given area, and the "ratable value" is £20,000, the rate in the pound will be one shilling, and so on. This ratable value is now copied into the ratebooks from parish valuation lists, prepared by the overseers under the supervision of the union assessment committees of the boards of guardians.2

Prior to the passing of the Parochial Assessments Act of 1836, there was no statutory regulation of valuations, and the

1 Mr. Goschen's Budget Speech, 1887.

2 See ante, p. 83.

utmost diversity of practice prevailed. In some cases the valuations were of very old standing, and even if they were originally fair and equal, had long ceased to be so. In most cases gross inequalities existed, and no pretense was made of uniformity of practice in the parishes contributing to a common county rate.1 Long after 1836, the practice of undervaluation continued to be resorted to by the overseers of parishes in backward districts, and it is not yet eradicated. It has, however, been further checked and minimized by the Union Assessment Committee Act of 1863. The form of valuation list now in use provides for the insertion in two columns of the "gross estimated rental" and "ratable value" of each holding; the former being based on the yearly rent which a tenant would pay who was required to pay also the tithe and the usual tenant's taxes. In those cases where the tenant undertakes to effect the repairs usually falling upon the landlord or any other of the usual landlord's charges, a corresponding addition is required to be made to the amount of his rent in assessing the "gross estimated rental." Where, on the other hand, the landlord contracts to pay the tithe or the usual tenant's taxes, a corresponding deduction is made for assessment purposes. Having thus found the gross estimated rental, the ratable value is arrived at by deducting therefrom such a proportion as will cover the average outgoings for repairs and insurance.

Although the acts of 1836 and 1863 gradually effected a great improvement, the machinery for carrying this scheme into operation still remains inadequate and inefficient, except in the metropolis. In the remainder of England and Wales no statutory provision exists for the obligatory periodic revaluation of the rated properties, and no effectual mode of ascertaining the rents and conditions of tenancy of the individual holdings has been applied to local tax assessments. A further element of confusion is furnished by the absence of uniformity in the scales of deduction for repairs and insurance adopted in the provincial unions. No scale is prescribed by statute (except for the metropolis) and considerable diversity prevails in

1 Lord Monteagle's Draft Report on Burdens on Land, pp. 17 and 24.

practice. In the metropolis the like unsatisfactory condition of affairs was ended by an act of 1869, under which the national and local valuation proceedings are unified, and a single valuation list governs all assessments in the parish for rates and taxes on real property. A single scale of deductions is also prescribed by the act for all the metropolitan parishes.

The progressive increase of the ratable value in England and Wales is shown in Tables II and XI, the latter of which gives a comparison of these figures with those of the valuations for the national real property tax in certain years.

The proportions of the total annual value of real property borne by the several principal classes thereof, in certain years, are as follows : 1

The amounts and proportions of the local rates borne by lands, houses and other properties, in 1817, 1868 and 1891, are as follows; 2 the differences in the percentages, when compared with those given above, being due to the relatively greater weight of the local taxation in urban areas than in rural districts:

1 From Mr. Fowler's Report on Local Taxation, 1893.

2 Ibid.

Mr. Fowler, in his recent report, shows that whilst the rate in the pound of all rates in London had risen from 4s. 41d. in 1868 to 5s. in 1890-91, and correspondingly in other urban districts, the figures of the total rates in rural districts in the same years fell from 2s. 7d. to 2s. 3d. He concludes an exhaustive analysis of the figures of the rural rates with the following observation :

Taking the table as a whole, it greatly strengthens the presumption which arises from the figures previously given, that at no period in the present century, for which statistics are available for the purposes of comparison, has the rate in the pound of the rural rates been as low as it was in 1890 and 1891 in the great majority of the counties of England and Wales; and that the counties in which the fall in the rate in the pound has been the greatest have, generally speaking, been the agricultural counties.2

It thus appears that whilst the rates as a whole have risen in recent years in London and the other urban districts, in spite of the enlarged aid received from national taxation, there has been, as the result of that aid, a not unsubstantial fall in those levied in rural districts.

It has already been stated that the local rates are assessed upon the basis of the valuation lists prepared by the parochial overseers. This is generally true alike of the rates made and collected by the overseers themselves (comprehended under the general head of poor rates) and of those made and collected by other local authorities. Owing, however, to the lack of uniformity in the preparation of the provincial valuation lists, the county authorities have been empowered to prepare an independent scheme or basis of contribution for the purpose of the county rates in each county, exclusive of the metropolis. The national property tax assessments are utilized for this purpose, and revised quotas or apportionments for the several parishes in each county are fixed at intervals of about seven years. Having determined the parochial quotas, they leave the overseers to levy the individual contributions as a part of, or

1 Local Taxation Report, 1893, p. I.

2 Ibid., p. 35.