COMMITTEE. (Hansard, 26 July 1860)

§ MR. AYRTON
expressed a hope that this clause would be struck out, as he saw no necessity for it. It recognized a principle, the practical effect of which was, that if a person was rich and gave money, he then could have a contribution out of this public fund.

SIR GEORGE LEWIS
said, the clause was simply permissive in its character, and he could not see that any harm would arise from it.

§ MR. FREELAND
proposed in the first part of this clause to substitute the eleventh day of October for the first day of August, 1884, which was agreed to. He then proposed to omit at the end of the clause the words which provided that no lease for such term of twenty-one years should be extended beyond the first day of August, 1884, which was agreed to. He then proposed to add to the clause the following words:— And a like extension, at the accustomed rate of fine, shall, for the purposes of sale, purchase, or exchange, be allowed in the case of any lease for lives, the extent and value of which shall be computed by arbitrators in default of an agreement between the parties to be less than the extent and value of a term ending on the said eleventh day of October one thousand eight hundred and eighty-four, which were also agreed to.

§ MR. INGHAM
moved a proviso empowering a lessee to enforce a sale of the reversion on the Commissioners, the value to be determined by arbitration.

§ MR. AYRTON
said, that was a clause for confiscating the whole property of the church to the lessees—and he could not understand what the right hon. Gentleman was about when he gave his assent to it.

§ MR. FREELAND
proposed after "determined," to insert— And where such lease shall relate to houses or building ground, it shall be lawful for the arbitrator or arbitrators or umpire, as the case may be, simply to find the gross sum to be paid for such sale or enfranchisement in such manner as he or they shall deem just: provided also, that in all cases regard shall be had to the long-continued practice of renewal, and that the arbitrators shall have power to decide whether ground is or is not to be valued as building ground. He said that, although arbitration did not give or profess to give what was infallibly right, it was a thoroughly English mode of getting rid of differences as to value between man and man. It gave in the long run a fair average of substantial justice. A similar clause for ascertaining by arbitration the value of Church house property had been recommended by a most able Committee of the House of Commons in 1856, and had been introduced in 1857 into the Bill which bore on the back of it the name of the noble Lord the Member for Tiverton. Between the mode of valuing Church house property adopted by Mr. Smith, the Surveyor to the Commissioners, and that contended for by the lessees, there was a difference, in point of value, of £800,000 on the whole. He hoped, therefore, that the Committee would admit the justice in such cases of a reference to arbitration.

SIR GEORGE LEWIS
said, there were two principles involved in what was now proposed. He was willing to assent to the principle of arbitration being applied to land, but the Ecclesiastical Commissioners thought if it were applied to house property it would have a deleterious effect.

§ MR. DEEDES
supported the view taken by the right hon. Gentleman (Sir George Lewis), and hoped the Committee would not agree to retain the word "houses" in the Amendment.

§ MR. BONHAM-CARTER
said, that he thought the word "houses" in the Amendment ought not to be allowed to jeopardise 196 the proposal with regard to building ground. He suggested that a special clause might be introduced to meet the case of house property.

§ MR. MOWBRAY
said, that there was a second Amendment to be proposed, which had reference to building ground only, and he would suggest, as the most convenient course to take, that his hon. Friend (Mr. Freeland) should withdraw his Proposition, and then move the insertion of the word "houses" in the next Amendment.

§ MR. FREELAND
assented, and withdrew his Amendment.

§ MR. BONHAM-CARTER
said, he would move the following addition at the end of the clause— And where such lease shall relate to building ground, it shall be lawful for the arbitrator or arbitrators or umpire, as the case may be, simply to find the gross sum to be paid for such sale or enfranchisement in such manner as he or they may deem just: provided also, that regard shall be had to any consideration given to the lessee by this Act on account of the long-continued practice of renewal.

§ MR. FREELAND
moved that the word "houses" be inserted after the words "building ground."

SIR GEORGE LEWIS
said, he had already made a concession with regard to building ground; but should it be the wish of the Committee to include house property he was willing to abide by that decision.

§ MR. DEEDES
was afraid that the effect of this Amendment, if carried, would be to cause great loss of property to the Church, and he hoped the Committee would not sanction it, unless the principle of valuation was distinctly understood.

SIR GEORGE LEWIS
said, he thought it would be safer for the present to abstain from legislation on the subject of house property, and confine the Amendment to the case of building ground. He was ready to abide by the decision of the Committee if they chose to include house property, but his impression was in favour of omitting it.

§ SIR JAMES GRAHAM
said, this was a most important question, as affecting the interests of the Church. It involved a sum of probably not less than £800,000. He had heard it stated that the subject was one which ought to be referred to a Select Committee, but he could not think there would be any advantage in taking that course. On the other hand, he did not wish, as an Ecclesiastical Commissioner, to show any reluctance to refer these questions to arbitration. At the 197 same time, he felt strongly that the decision of the question would mainly turn on the choice of an umpire. The arbitrators, on a matter beset with so many difficulties, might disagree, and the appointment of an umpire was therefore a question of very great importance. He thought that if the subject were postponed till the Report was brought up it might be possible in the interval to frame a clause that would meet all the difficulties of the case. He deprecated a hasty decision on a question involving an immense amount of Church property; and he felt strongly that the Committee had not before them at that moment the materials for legislation.

SIR GEORGE LEWIS
said, he had not formed any strong opinion on the matter, but he took it in this way, that the Commissioners, who devoted great attention to the subject, had acted upon a certain principle, which they believed to be important for preserving the value of the property committed to their care. That was the report they made to the Executive Government, and, therefore, he did not feel justified in giving up that principle. Pie should be glad if the question could be arbitrated on fair principles, and by persons acting under a feeling of official responsibility, but he should not like to see it committed to the chance decision of profesional surveyors. He was not desirous of making what might be considered a hard bargain on the part of the Church, as against the lessees, and he would be happy if this matter could be arbitrated upon a fair principle by a person acting under a sense of responsibility, but his right hon. Friend had not suggested any means by which that end might be attained.

§ SIR JAMES GRAHAM
said, each party might appoint an arbitrator, and, in case of their disagreeing, an umpire should be appointed. The only question was by whom. At the present moment, he should be sorry to impose the task upon the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster; but there was the Vice-Chancellor of the Duchy, who was a lawyer of distinction, and holding his office permanently;—he would be a most proper person to decide a matter of this nature.

§ Mr. NEWDEGATE and Mr. MOWBRAY
approved of the suggestion of the right hon. Baronet.

MR. HENLEY
said, the importance of this question could hardly be overrated, and he hoped it would be dealt with on the bringing up of the Report.

SIR GEORGE LEWIS
said, if it was thought that the Home Secretary might not exercise an impartial judgment in the matter, he would suggest the Lord Chancellor, who would be above all such suspicion. In the meantime the clause, as proposed to be amended, might be passed, and he would be prepared on the Report to make some proposition on this subject, which he hoped would be acceptable to the House.

§ MR. FREELAND
said, that if the Home Secretary would undertake to bring up a clause on the Report incorporating his proposal as to house property with the suggestion of the right hon. Baronet (Sir James Graham) as regarded the appointment of an umpire, he (Mr. Freeland) would not now press his Amendment.

SIR GEORGE LEWIS,
in order that there might be no mistake, would repeat what he meant to do. He would now accede to the Amendment proposed by the hon. Member for Winchester, and would bring up on the Report a clause declaring the system of arbitration to be followed in the case of house property, and providing for the appointment of an umpire.

§ MR. FREELAND
then proposed to insert the following clauses:— The Ecclesiastical Commissioners shall not, except under special circumstances, assign as a permanent endowment to any Ecclesiastical Corporation, sole or aggregate, lands or hereditaments lying within the boundaries of any Parliamentary Borough, or within two miles of the cathedral church of any cathedral town, and not being lands or hereditaments used or to be used as a residence, or as residences of any Ecclesiastical Corporation, sole or aggregate, or as a school, cathedral, or church, or lands and hereditaments adjoining to and intended to be occupied with such residence or residences, school, cathedral, or church respectively. In any case in which it shall be found impossible or inexpedient to give effect to the provision lastly hereinbefore contained, the said Ecclesiastical Commissioners shall lay upon the Table of both Houses of Parliament, if Parliament be then sitting, or, it not, then within one month after the then next sitting of Parliament, a statement of the contents and position of the estate proposed to be assigned, and of the grounds on which it has been found impossible or inexpedient to give effect to the provision lastly hereinbefore contained; and if at the end of forty days after the presentation of such statement no Address praying the Crown to withhold its consent from any such arrangement 199 shall be presented by either House of Parliament, the said Commissioners from and after the expiration of such period shall take the necessary Steps for carrying the proposed arrangement into effect. He said he was most anxious that these Amendments should be introduced into the Bill. He thought that if lands were re-transferred as permanent endowments to Ecclesiastical Corporations within or in the immediate neighbourhood of Parliamentary boroughs or cathedral towns great political jealousy would arise, in consequence of the change of tenure now about to he introduced with reference to church property. According to the old system the lessee, so long as he paid the renewal fines and quit-rents, was virtually the owner of the property. At all events, he was politically independent. But, according to the proposed new system, the lessee of church lands was to hold them at rack-rent for a term, or as tenant from year to year. They might thus become a source of great political influence, especially if (as without doubt they would be, if situate within or near a borough) they were what are called accommodation lands. The retransfer, too, of lands near towns as permanent estates was inexpedient, as it would tend to stop building operations; for, although the lands would be subject to powers for enfranchising or granting building leases, yet, as the Ecclesiastical Corporations under the proposed new system would have no interest in exercising these powers, they would probably be but seldom exercised.

SIR GEORGE LEWIS
said, if they were making a law for Chichester the proposed clauses might be very proper, but as they were making laws for the whole country other places must be considered as well. The radius of two miles would, for instance, be wholly inapplicable as regarded London. He did not think it expedient that the Commissioners should be deprived of the discretionary power which they at present possessed.

MR. HENLEY
said, he was very glad that the Government would not assent to the clauses. The matter ought to be left to the discretion of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners.

§ MR. NEWDEGATE
said, he thought the hon. Gentleman had hardly considered the importance of this Amendment. He hoped the Home Secretary would continue his resistance to the clauses.

§ MR. WHALLEY
said, that although disposed to support the clauses of the hon. Member for Chichester, he thought it right 200 to state that, representing a city in which the Ecclesiastical Commissioners had great estates within the borough, their management of those estates was as remarkable for doing the best that could be done for the property as for their abstaining from all political interference. The Commissioners were quite entitled to this testimony. Peterborough and its neighbourhood had derived the greatest benefit from the operation of this Commission, and the freedom given to ecclesiastical property, as was manifest by the constant extension of buildings and improvements of all kinds, in consequence of the operation of this Commission, and he felt it right to bear his testimony as well to their management as to the conduct of the Commission, in reference to political and local matters. He believed that he could bear similar testimony for other places besides Peterborough.

§ MR. FREELAND
said, that the case of London referred to by the Home Secretary would fall within the exception on the ground of special circumstances referred to in the first of his clauses. As, however, there appeared to be no chance of carrying these clauses on the present occasion he would not now press them to a division.

§ MR. FREELAND
then proposed the following clause for the compulsory enfranchisement of intermixed lands:— In any case in which lands leased by any Ecclesiastical Corporation he intermixed with lands possessed by any lessee or trustee as freehold or copyhold of inheritance, the said Corporation, with the approval in writing of the said Church Estates Commissioners, or the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, if the said lands shall have become vested in them, shall, within three months after the receipt of a notice in writing from the said lessee or trustee stating that he is desirous of purchasing the lands so leased, offer for sale to such lessee or trustee the reversion of such lands; and if the parties shall not be able to come to an agreement as to the value of such reversion, then either party may require the other party to join in referring to arbitration the finding of the value of such reversion on the principles and in manner herein mentioned; and when such value shall have been so found it shall be binding on both parties, if either party require it, to complete the proposed arrangement on the terms settled by the arbitrators, or their umpire, as the case may be.

§ MR. FREELAND
then proposed the following Clause:— Wherever the estate and interest under any such lease or grant may be vested in any trustee 201 or trustees, either expressly or by implication of Law, and any monies, stocks, funds, or securities for money are vested in the same trustees or trustee, upon the same or like trusts, it shall be lawful for such trustees or trustee, with the consent of the person or persons entitled for the time being to the beneficial receipt of the dividends or annual proceeds of such monies, stocks, funds, or securities, if such person or persons shall be capable of giving consent, or if there shall be no person capable of giving consent, or if such consent shall be withheld and the trustee or trustees shall consider such a course essential to the interest of the parties entitled under the settlement, then with the sanction and approbation of the Court of Chancery, to be obtained on petition to the said Court, to raise out of such monies, or by sale of such stocks, funds, or securities, a sufficient Bum for the purpose of purchasing the reversion of, or otherwise enfranchising, the property comprised in such lease or grant, and of procuring, if necessary for the purpose of enfranchisement, the renewal of such lease or grant, and to pay and apply the same accordingly, and all payments and applications of monies, or of the proceeds of the sale of such stocks, funds, or securities so made as aforesaid, shall be valid and binding on all persons interested under the trust, will, or settlement under or by which such monies, stocks, funds, or securities for money, may be held in trust or settled as aforesaid.

§ MR. FREELAND
then proposed the following Clause:— In any case in which the estate and interest under any lease or grant made by any Ecclesiastical Corporation may be vested in any trustee or trustees, and such trustee or trustees shall not have power to sell, it shall be lawful for such trustee or trustees, with the consent in writing of the person or persons entitled for the time being to the beneficial receipt of the rent or annual proceeds thereof, if such person or persons shall be capable of giving consent, or if there shall be no person capable of giving consent, or if such consent shall be withheld and the trustee or trustees shall consider a sale essential to the interest of parties entitled under the settlement, then with the sanction and approbation of the Court of Chancery, to be obtained on petition to the said Court, to sell and dispose of all or any part of such property; and in every such case the purchase money shall be paid to such trustee or trustees, whose receipt shall be a good discharge for the same; and the money so paid to such trustee or trustees shall be invested and be held by him or them upon the same trusts, as far as the circumstances of the case will admit, as the leasehold property, if not sold, would have been subject to.

SIR GEORGE LEWIS
said, if it could be shown that any great evil arose from the present system of church leases it might be desirable to submit to an infraction of the laws of property which were usually recognized in this country, and allow a system of compulsory enfranchisement. He did not believe, however, that any such case had been made out. Even 202 if there had been he did not think they ought to adopt an unilateral system. If they gave a power to the lessee to compel the Church they ought to give a corresponding power to the Church to compel the lessee; and in many instances there might be extreme hardship in compelling the lessee to adopt the course which the clause pointed out. He could not assent to the introduction of the clause.

MR. HOWARD
said, he would move a clause providing for the augmentation of benefices up to £100 per annum. In moving this clause he wished to call the attention of the Committee to the condition of the poorer clergy, and he would especially refer them to the case of Carlisle and its neighbourhood. The Bishop of the diocese was provided with a beautiful palace, though rather too far from Carlisle for his clergy to get at him, and the Dean and Chapter had a large income. He believed that when certain leases fell in the income of the latter would amount to not less than £21,000 a year; and, as much of this income would be derived from lands in the neighbourhood, he hoped the small livings in Carlisle would, in due time, receive an augmentation. There were four parishes in Carlisle; the population was 70,000; and the highest stipend received by any of the clergymen was £150 a year, while another received only £85 a year. Matters were still worse in the country parts of the diocese. There were 259 livings in the diocese; 108 of which were less than £100 a year; 69 less than £80 a year, and many of the incumbents received less than £50 a year. In such circumstances the Committee would see that it was impossible to provide adequately for the spiritual instruction of the people. In old times, when the incumbents were able to live frugally in the retired parishes among the hills, the evil was not so bad; but the expense of living was now so much increased that they were hardly able to sustain themselves and their families. He was informed by the Bishop and other ecclesiastical authorities of the diocese that it was impossible to provide proper or efficient persons to give religious instruction to the people. It might be said the Ecclesiastical Commissioners had more populous places than Carlisle to provide for, but surely they ought to do something for a district so destitute as Carlisle. He would not ask how many fine palaces had been built, but he would say that there was 203 much cause to complain of the past and present conduct of the Commissioners. Instead of augmenting the livings of the poor clergy they had increased, he heard, the salaries of their own officials. That might be right in itself, but the object of the Commission being to make better provision for the small livings, they should have been attended to in the first instance. He had heard the other day too that the Dean of York—a person deservedly popular in the city—had had his salary greatly increased. That also might be a proper thing, but he maintained that the first duty of the Commissioners was to attend to the poor clergy.

§ MR. THOMPSON
said, he should cordially support the clause. He stated the case of a parish from which the Commissioners had drawn funds to the amount of between £8,000 and £9,000. The living was a very small one, and there was no parsonage. An offer of contributions to the amount of £600 was made to the Commissioners if they would contribute £200 to the building of a parsonage, but they replied that the case did not come within their rules. In another case where the living was £150 a year, and where the tithe rent-charge, of which the Commissioners had the reversion, was £2,800 a year, they also said they could not make a grant, as it did not come under their rules. Nobody disputed that the Dean of York was an excellent man, and he had no doubt that the money given to him by the Commissioners would be well spent, but that was not the question. It was the duty of the Commissioners in the first instance to look to the comfort of those working clergy, who were struggling with the evils of poverty. The great complaint against the Commission was that the funds were not expended in the relief of the most necessitous cases.

SIR GEORGE LEWIS
said, the Committee had decided the day previous in favour of a proposition that would give to localities in the neighbourhood of lands held by the Commission a certain preference; but his hon. Friend now asked them to come to a decision which would be inconsistent with any such preference being given to local claims. He said the Commission ought to consider first the most necessitous cases. If that was done, then they must abandon all preference for particular localities. But if the clause proposed by his hon. Friend were passed it 204 would not effect any alteration of the existing law. He believed that the Commissioners could take into consideration any case that came before them; and there was nothing in the clause that would change their mode of procedure. If it was intended that benefices under £100 were to have a preference over all others in the matter of augmentation, then the clause was at variance with others that had gone before it.

§ MR. NEWDEGATE
said, he believed the Ecclesiastical Commissioners had adopted a rule that they would not give relief in any case where the population did not exceed 2,500. Why should the line be drawn at that particular amount of population? He thought the proposal of the hon. Member deserved more attention than it had received. The means of the poorer clergy were much more restricted now than formerly, in consequence of increased competition in educational and literary pursuits; and the clergy were unable to apply their talents in other directions. He thought it would be very proper for Parliament to lay down the rule that no clergyman should be expected to exist on less than £80 or £100 a year.

§ MR. DEEDES
said, no one regretted more than he did that there should be a single incumbent with an income of less than £100 a year. Since he had a seat at the Board he had anxiously taken into consideration every such case that had been brought forward; in point of fact, he could tell his hon. Friend that every single case brought forward this year had been gone into by a Committee, which was appointed for the purpose, and consisted of the Estates. Committee of the Commission, and one or two other Members; and that, with one or two exceptions, where the population was under 100, grants had been given to all the cases where the income was less than £100. But if they were to agree to this clause, the discretion of the Commissioners would be taken away as to the appropriation of their funds. Every year the regulations under which the Commissioners agreed to receive applications for grants, were published and circulated as widely as possible; and he might state that, at the instance of the Bishop of Carlisle, the regulations were last year altered so as to take into account area as well as population. A given day was named as the last on which applications, coming from any part of the kingdom, would be received for the 205 benefactions placed at the disposal of the Commissioners. These applications were all classified and gone into very carefully. The system under which benefactions were received, excluded from the benefit those poor parishes that could not offer benefactions; but he hoped to see a fund, say £10,000 a year, laid aside to meet such cases. They must be very careful, however, that they did nothing to stop the stream of benevolence that had been pouring in for the last few years. Last year there were offers of not less than £237,000 in the way of benefactions; and he thought, therefore, they should be cautious lest, in making grants independent of benefactions, they took a step that would check this flow of liberality. Allusion had been made to the augmentation of the salary of the Dean of York. That was considered to be necessary, in order to make the salary equal to what it was understood to be when the present dean was appointed. To make up the difference between what the salary was stated to be nominally, and the actual amount, the Commissioners had consented to make the augmentation. There was a difference of opinion on the subject, however: and the opinion of the law officers of the Crown had been taken. That was in favour of the legality of the proceeding. He did not himself think that the Commissioners ought to have taken that step without coming to Parliament.

§ MR. SPOONER
said, he cordially agreed with the hon. Member for East Kent (Mr. Deedes) that the grant of £1,000 a year to the Dean of York was a most unjustifiable proceeding, considering that there were incumbents starving on £80 a year. He hoped that in future no such grant would be made, till the actual wants of the poor clergy were supplied.

§ MR. CAYLEY
said, he wished to know whether the Commissioners were precluded by any rule they had laid down from dealing with such cases, as the hon. Member for Cumberland had referred to?

§ MR. DEEDES
said, there was no rule laid down by the Commissioners to prevent their considering any application that might be made to them.

§ MR. BARROW
said, that in many cases the parishes, the value of whose livings was so small, had a fair claim upon capitular revenues.

§ SIR JAMES GRAHAM
observed that hitherto the attention of the Commission had been directed to the spiritual destitution of the great masses of the commu- 206 nity. He did not deny that the poverty of the clergy in many instances was inconsistent with the efficient spiritual instruction of the people, and this was a matter which all must deeply regret. The rule of the Commission in former years had been to confine the augmentations to populous places; but, at the instance of the Bishop of Carlisle, last year population alone ceased to be the consideration in such cases, and the question of area was combined with that of population. The consequence had been a considerable augmentation of the incomes of many of the poorer clergy in the diocese of Carlisle and elsewhere. It would be impossible, in his opinion, to adopt the rule that all livings should be brought up to £100 a year. Such a rule it would not be wise to adopt. He disapproved the augmentation of the income of the Dean of York. He thought it a matter of doubtful policy, and was of opinion that, though the Commission might have had the legal power to do so, it was a step which should not have been taken without coming to Parliament. Accordingly, he thought it his duty, though unsuccessfully, to resist the augmentation.

§ MR. DEEDES
pointed out that one effect of the clause, if carried, would be to discourage the giving of endowments for more than £100 a year. They would have endowments of £50 or £60 a year, and then the Commissioners would be expected to raise them to £100.

MR. HOWARD
said, it ought to be understood that such a rule should not prevail in the case of private patrons, unless a grant were made by the Commissioners to be met by one of equal amount from other sources.

MR. HENLEY
said, he had always been in favour of giving great discretionary powers to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, but he believed that the exercise of that discretion in the case of the Dean of York's salary would do more to shake the confidence of the public in the Commission than anything that had occurred for years, while it might lead the House to lay down hard rules for the guidance of the Commissioners in future.

§ MR. WESTHEAD
said, the office o Dean of York required a large expenditure, as a great deal of hospitality was expected from him. Two years ago he proposed in the Bill then before the House that the salary of the future Deans should be £2,000 a year, and the people of York were quite willing, but they were not will- 207 ing that the present Dean should receive that salary, as his private fortune was quite adequate; but they thought that at the next avoidance the salary should be raised to the same amount as that of the Dean of Canterbury. However, he wholly disapproved the manner in which it had been done by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners.

§ VISCOUNT ENFIELD
proposed to add a clause after Clause 47, giving compensation to the clergy within the Metropolitan area for the loss of fees in consequence of the discontinuance of burials in their church-yards; he stated that the Metropolitan Interments Act, which was passed in 1850, authorized the Board of Health by an order in Council to cause the discontinuance of burials in parochial burial grounds. That statute recognized the rights of the incumbents to compensation for the loss of their burial fees; accordingly the General Board of Health directed an inquiry into the claims for compensation under that Act; the inquiry was conducted by Mr. C. Z. Macaulay, Assistant Secretary to the Board, and by Mr. H. K. Williams, Treasurer under that Act. These Gentlemen, having ascertained the facts bearing upon these claims, recommended the annual amount which should be given to each incumbent. The result of these inquiries, including the sums claimed and allowed in the case of each parish, has been printed as "A return to an order of the House of Lords, dated April 26, 1858." The clergy having had their claims thus investigated for the purpose of having compensation given to them under the provisions of an Act of Parliament were justified in expecting that they should not suffer pecuniary loss by the disuse of their burial grounds. But to this day they have not received the expected compensation, for the Act of 1850 was repealed in 1852 by the Metropolitan Burials Act; the Board of Health then lost all jurisdiction in the matter, and the claims for compensation which that Board had investigated and approved have remained unsatisfied to the present time; these losses have been alluded to in the Report of the Select Committee of the House of Lords appointed to inquire into the deficiency of the means of spiritual instruction, dated April 1858. An opportunity for providing the means for com- 208 pensating the clergy now presents itself the Bill now before the Committee provides in Clause 47 that compensation shall be given from out (it is presumed) of the funds in the hands of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners to surveyors, lawyers, and others who may suffer loss by the change made in the method of letting or managing church property, and a slight extension of the provisions of that clause is all that is required for granting compensation for the losses occasioned by the discontinuance of burials in the Metropolitan churches and churchyards.

SIR GEORGE LEWIS
admitted that great hardship had been caused by the loss of fees in the way referred to, and if any means could be devised, without making a charge on the funds of the Church, to make up incomes that had been so affected, he would be glad to give it his best consideration, but he did not think it was a matter that could be provided for in the present Bill, and, therefore, he must oppose the clause.

§ MR. ALCOCK
moved to insert a clause enabling the Commissioners, if they should think fit, to release any rent-charge granted, or transferred to them by way of endowment of any church or chapel, in consideration of the transfer into their names of a sum in consols producing dividends equal in amount to such rent-charge, and also enabling them to release a portion of the lands on which a rent-charge was chargeable, provided that the residue of such lands was of sufficient value to yield the rent-charge.

§ MR. THOMPSON
moved to add a clause enabling the Commissioners to borrow money from the governors of Queen Anne's Bounty or from the Exchequer Loan Commissioners to make up any deficiency arising from the non-renewal of leases.

§ MR. JOHN LOCKE
moved a clause extending the benefit of the provisions in favour of lessees to sub-lessees.

§ MR. CAVENDISH BENTINCK
said, he would move that the Commissioners be empowered to make grants to such persons connected with St. Paul's Cathedral and Westminster Abbey as had accepted a commutation of their claims in 1840. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners felt themselves compelled to discontinue the grants which had been made, and his object was 209 to prevent the reimposition of the fees by the vergers who had accepted the commutation.

SIR GEORGE LEWIS
expressed his opinion that the clause was unnecessary.