FINANCE BILL.—(No. 190.)

HC Deb 08 June 1894 vol 25 cc694-759

COMMITTEE. [Progress, 7th June]

[NINTH NIGHT.]

Bill considered in Committee.

(In the Committee.)

Clause 3.

MR. GRANT LAWSON (York,N.R., Thirsk)

said, he had on the Paper an Amendment to secure the insertion of the words "to any person" after "passing" in line 33. His object in putting it down was mainly to show the undesirability of aggregating properties passing into dead hands with property passing to the family of the deceased. But he felt that it would be very difficult to discuss the matter without trenching on the very verge of Order, even if not over-stepping the bounds, and, under the circumstances, he did not propose to move it.

COLONEL KENYON-SLANEY (Shropshire, Newport)

said, he wished to move an Amendment to leave out in the first paragraph of the clause the words "aggregated so as to form one estate," and to insert in their place "separated so as to form two estates—the one personal, the other real." He said he was confronted by the usual difficul- ties which faced any private Member who represented the landed interest in dealing with this question, and among those difficulties was the attitude adopted by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. At one time, for instance, he spoke kindly and considerately of the landed interest, and expressed a hope which was, no doubt, real and genuine, that his measure would not prove so harmful as some of them seemed to anticipate, but at other times he seemed to feel a pleasure in levelling taunts at it, and almost insinuated that the landowners were not indisposed to evade their fair share of the burdens of the country. In those circumstances, it was only natural that the statements and action of the right hon. Gentleman with regard to matters affecting the landed interest should be regarded with some degree of suspicion, or want of confidence. They could hardly be expected to accept without suspicion the wooden horse he had offered them, although it might be modelled on the precise lines of Ladas. Another difficulty to be contended with was the fact that few of the occupants of the Front Bench seemed to combine the qualifications necessary for thoroughly discussing the question as it affected the land. But very few of them appeared to have gone in for the happy combination of sons and acres. If they were to come to a right and just conclusion on this subject, it was absolutely necessary that regard should be paid to the opinions of those who had full practical knowledge, and that mere theoretical fancies should have little weight. Yet he looked almost in vain amongst hon. Members opposite for anyone who had the requisite practical knowledge to deal with the question. He did not wish to pit his classics against those of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, but he had a recollection of reading somewhere the line, Apparent rari nantes in gurgite vasto, which seemed to him applicable to this case; for, when he looked up and down the Ministerial Benches in search of representatives of the agricultural interest, he saw only one or two struggling on the top of the waves and in the vast deep. The position of those who stood there as the defenders of real property, and especially as the defenders of rural realty, no doubt, was open to very trenchant criticism, and he might possibly be charged with iteration and re- iteration of the arguments put forward in the previous nights' Debates. But they were driven into that iteration and reiteration by the action of the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself, because on all essential points on which they wished to have a clear and distinct statement as to the mode and basis of calculation on which real property would have to pay the proposed tax the right hon. Gentleman had been either unwilling or unable to give it them, although had he done so he might have disarmed much of their hostility and have satisfied their reason even if not their hopes and longings. But as the case now stood they were, so to speak, advancing through a jungle; they had around them enemies unseen but not the less bitterly hostile; they might be confronted with them at any moment, and therefore they were obliged to do as soldiers did—to burn the jungle as they advanced and to clear their way step by step. They were bound to take advantage of every opportunity that was afforded them. What was his present proposal? It was simply that they should, for the purposes of the Estate Duty, absolutely and entirely separate real property from personal property. It might be suggested that that was going too far in respect of real property, which might be either urban or rural in its nature. If that, however, was the only objection, and if he were met in a conciliatory spirit on the main point, he might be prepared to leave the question of rural realty for further consideration. His Amendment conceded one-half of the chief argument of the Government; it conceded the principle of graduation, but not the principle of aggregation. The right hon. Gentleman had told them that unless they adopted both principles, the whole scheme would fall to the ground like a pack of cards; but he would like to know why that which had proved possible in the colonies, should be impossible in the Mother Country. What reasons had he to adduce in support of his argument that the separation of the two principles was not only possible and rightful but also advantageous? His reasons were twofold. First, he would submit that the character and circumstances of the two sorts of property were so absolutely different, that it would be only fair and just that they should be differently dealt with. Secondly, he had to contend that the separation should take place in the common interest of the community. As to the essential difference in the character and circumstances of the two classes, surely that could not be denied? Take an estate of £100,000, of which £50,000 was in rural realty, and the remaining moiety in personal property. Under the proposal of the Budget the £100,000 would be aggregated, and would pay 6 per cent., or £6,000. Under his suggestion, the realty would be separated from the personalty; each would pay on the graduated scale up to £50,000; and the duty in each case would amount to £2,500. What were the circumstances surrounding the two estates? The personalty of £50,000 could with all fair probability be invested at 4 per cent., and would produce, therefore, an income of £2,000 a year. But before that income reached the pocket of the owner, he would like to know what good it had done to the community at large, and how many of the masses had benefited by it? Then let them take the case of the realty of £50,000. They well knew that it would not produce on the average £1,000 a year; that could be easily demonstrated. But they should trace the course of that money before it reached the pocket of the owner of the realty for spending purposes. How many people were benefited in the course of its transmission, and how many sections of the community got some good from it before it passed as spendable money into the pocket of the owner? If on the one hand they had a double income doing half the good and on the other half the income doing double the good, did not that constitute a fair case for difference in the treatment of the two classes of property? Then, again, it should be borne in mind that in the case of the personalty it was perfectly easy at the shortest notice and without the slightest damage to what remained to realise a portion in order, if necessary, to pay off the charges that became due under the Budget. But in the case of realty it was very different, and it was well known it was not practicable to sell a portion. On that point he would appeal to the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself. The right hon. Gentleman had in that House prided himself on being the trustee of a large number of landed properties; he was, therefore, conversant with the circumstances, and would admit that it was often impossible to sell a farm off a property without irreparably damaging the remainder of the estate. On these grounds he thought he had justified his assertion that the circumstances and character of the two classes of property were so different as to justify the Amendment he had introduced. Now he came to his contention that the separation would be in the interests of the community at large—in the interests of the various classes and sections which go to make up the nationality of the country. He supposed it would be admitted to be of first importance that moneyed men should be encouraged to invest in land and to expend upon it that superfluity of cash which many were happy enough to possess. It might be said that he was dealing only with large landowners and large properties, and that therefore he was not entitled to speak of the interests of the community at large. But that was not so, for there were hundreds and thousands of small people who were interested in this question. Let them take the small agricultural towns which studded not only his constituency but the whole country. In them how many scores of thousands of men were to be found who, though they were tradesmen and owners, perhaps, of a certain amount of personalty, had, out of love for agriculture, invested one-half of the property in rural realty. Such people were immensely interested in this Budget. They would know that for every £500 they had got invested in personalty and for every £500 in realty they would have to pay 2 per cent., so long as the two classes of property were kept separate, but that the moment they were aggregated the charge would go up to 3 per cent., and £30 instead of £20 would be the payment. And in the case of men who had to consider the expenditure of every farthing of their income it would become a matter of serious moment when they discovered that the duty on that moiety of their property which paid only 2 per cent, was as high as it was on the half which gave a return of 4 per cent. Treating the case as men of business, they would be induced to get rid of their investments in realty and to multiply their investments in personalty. What must be the absolute result of that? It would drive out of the ownership of land that very class of small owners they had been trying to create— the class of small, prosperous tradesmen in towns who like to dabble in rural concerns. Of course, it was equally plain that the large landowners also would be prejudicially affected. It was well known that investments in land would only produce 2 per cent., whilst other investments would produce 4 per cent. Let hon. Members who were familiar with life in country villages imagine what would be the result of the scheme of the Government. The change to the small landowners would be a change from affluence to beggary and to desertion of the land itself. It was not a question of that tiresome personage, the "millionaire," that the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer was so fond of bringing under the notice of the House; it was a question of the small owners who depended upon continued interest being taken in rural England. Just in proportion as these people were discouraged and made to feel that it was undesirable for them to identify themselves with rural interest, so was a blow being struck at our national prosperity and the interests of society, which justified the moving of the present Amendment. Further than that, it would be conceded that it was to the general advantage of the community that people should be as nearly as possible able to calculate the value of that which they would leave behind them. If his Amendment were adopted it would be possible for the owner of rural realty to calculate pretty accurately what that realty would produce to the individual to whom it was left. And there would be another advantage which would appeal to all sides of the House. It would be conceded that it would be to the general advantage of the community that there should be prompt probate and settlement of wills. He thought from the point of view of those who were to inherit property in small proportions it was of almost vital importance that there should be a rapid winding up of affairs and quick transference of the property bequeathed. What happened now? Take such a property as that he had referred to—a property, say, of £100,000 gross value divided into two equal halves of rural realty and personalty. It would be wound up and transferred in a few days. But as long as the two classes of property were aggregated and personalty had to wait till all the arrangements concerning realty were completed, they would treble and quadruple the time when the money could reach the pockets of those who were intended to have it. It would not only increase the delay but the expense also, for every week lawyers were employed on things of this sort multiplied the costs. His object was to get the money into the pockets of those entitled to have it as soon as possible and to let as little of it as possible get into the pockets of the lawyers on the way.

Amendment proposed, in page 2, line 33, to leave out the words "aggregated so as to form one estate," and insert— separated so as to form two estates, the one personal the other real."—(colonel Kenyon-Slaney.)

Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause."

SIR W. HARCOURT

said, the Leader of the Opposition on the previous night had claimed a special right to discuss the subject before the Committee because he had no personal interest in the question of settlements in England, being a bachelor and all his property being situated in Scotland. But the hon. and gallant Gentleman, on the other hand, had charged them with misunderstanding the question because they had no interest in it. They had, he said, no sons, and, therefore, no interest. He (Sir W. Harcourt) had a son, and he was also one of those small holders for whom the hon. and gallant Gentleman was so solicitous. He possessed at least three acres and a cow, and, therefore, he might claim to be an interested person. What was the hon. and gallant Gentleman's claim? It was that on this question of aggregation, real and persona? property should be separated and dealt with separately. But the first object of the Bill was to equalise real and personal property in relation to the Death Duties, and it was, therefore, rather late in the day to come forward and maintain that the former ought to be treated on a more favourable footing than the latter. The hon. and gallant Gentleman argued that a man possessing £50,000 of realty and £50,000 of personalty should not be treated as owning £100,000, but as if be were two men, each owning £50,000. That was contrary to the view of the Government. The Amendment of the hon. Member was really a claim for exemption for real property. He did not agree that the Amendment, if incorporated in the Bill, would be of benefit to the community; and he spoke as one who was a small proprietor himself and dabbled a little in rural affairs, and consequently lie was not without a certain personal interest in the matter. There was no equity in the proposal. The Committee might depend upon it that there was nothing more strongly felt in the country than that hitherto real property bad been exempted from taxation in a manner in which other property had not been. That was a fundamental fact in the demand for reform in regard to the Death Duties. The Amendment could not be accepted; indeed, it was absolutely contrary to an Amendment proposed from the Front Opposition Bench last night, which did contemplate aggregating together real and personal property. The hon, and gallant Gentleman claimed that real and personal property should be separated, and differently dealt with. Such a proposition, however, was a complete negative of the principle of the Bill, and of the foundation on which the Budget rested. After what they had heard last night from the Front Bench, as to aggregation of real and personal property, it was a little late in the day to have heard the arguments of the hon. and gallant Gentleman.

MR. CHAPLIN (Lincolnshire, Sleaford)

said, he was sure that both sides of the Committee would welcome the advent of the right hon. Gentleman into the arena in the capacity of a small owner of laud. He (Mr. Chaplin) was afraid, however, that the right hon. Gentleman's argument would be none the more satisfactory for that reason in replying to the earnest statement advanced by the hon. and gallant Member who had moved the Amendment. The right hon. Gentleman appeared to have two stock arguments which be invariably produced in opposition to each Amendment—either it was contrary to the principle of the Bill, which was graduation, or else it would land the Exchequer in insolvency. That was his (Mr. Chaplin's) observation on the general tone and character of the replies of the right hon. Gentleman. To-day the right hon. Gentleman had fallen back on the argument that the Amendment was against the principle of the Bill. The right hon. Gentleman said that the principle of the Bill was equalisation of the two kinds of property, and that to accept the Amendment would be tantamount to an exemption in favour of real property. But in saying that he entirely misapprehended the object of the Amendment; it did not involve any such exemption; it simply contemplated the division of property into two classes. The right hon. Gentleman said it was bard indeed to have a discussion raised again on the question as to whether graduation and graduation were to be accepted in the measure. He (Mr. Chaplin) could quite understand that it was annoying to the right hon. Gentleman to have these questions raised so often; but it was the fault of the Bill, which raised points to which the Opposition were bound to call attention. The right hon. Gentleman ought to have foreseen that objections would crop up in clause after clause that they were bound to discuss and put before the Committee. The right hon. Gentleman must, therefore, bear with patience a repetition of arguments which the Opposition not only had a right to submit, but in regard to which they would be wanting in their duty to their constituents if they did not enforce them as emphatically as they could. The right hon. Gentleman said there would be no equity in the proposal. But even if that point arose (and he denied that it did) it was not only the question of equity they had to consider, but also a question of expediency. What were the reasons given by the hon. and gallant Gentleman for his proposal to divide these two classes of property? His argument was, in effect, that if these two classes of property were to be tied together—graduated and charged in proportion—the result would be that very often the landed property would be swamped and destroyed. The reasons for the division were enforced by a letter which appeared in The Times that morning. The writer was a landowner—not of a large property, but one of some size—larger probably than that of the right hon. Gentleman opposite. He had spent an appreciable portion of his income every year in improvements. What, so far as this landowner was concerned, was the first result of the proposal of the Chancellor of the Exchequer? Why, he had been obliged to turn off a number of workmen in order to meet the necessity for insurance to provide for Estate Duty, so that when his enjoyment of the property ceased his successor should not be compelled to dispose of it. Similar action would have to be taken in hundreds of cases. Such reasons, quite apart from the principle of the Bill, might induce the Government to consider whether it was desirable that real property should be placed on the same footing as personalty. The aggregation of both would entail a heavy burden upon them. Personalty might be able to bear it, but what the Government persistently shut their eyes to was that realty occupied a totally different position, and would be placed at an enormous disadvantage. Good reasons had been given against it. The right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer said he had heard no good reasons against it. He said it would be a mistake to maintain any difference whatever between the two classes of property. A. difference of that kind, he said, had always been complained of in the past days by the Liberal Party. It had not always been complained of. The two kinds of property were treated on a different footing, for the precise and specific reason advanced and urged by no one more than the right hon. Gentleman the late Leader of the Liberal Party (Mr. Gladstone). He (Mr. Chaplin) was astounded that the Chancellor of the Exchequer should say that no good reasons had ever been advanced for not taxing real property on its capital value. Two or three times in the course of these Debates he (Mr. Chaplin) had reminded the right hon. Gentleman of the statements of his own late Leader. On each of those occasions the right hon. Gentleman had absolutely ignored those statements. He had not attempted to grapple with the difficulties for a moment, and he (Mr. Chaplin) called on him and his colleagues to do so now if they could. The reasons of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Midlothian were these: he laid it down that to tax realty on its capital value would entail a heavy effect, and sooner or later such taxation must become an engine for dispossessing an owner of his property. He said that was a monstrous position, and a purpose to which no tax ought to be applied. If that were the case with a moderate tax, what would it be with an immoderate one? No one could deny that a tax which in certain circumstances would amount to 18 per cent, on the capital value was immoderate in the extreme, and became what the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Midlothian charged it with being — an odious, unwise, unjust, and offensive imposition. Under these circumstances, the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer could not be surprised if, when the legitimate opportunity occurred, the Opposition raised objection to the proposal of the Government, and did point out the objections to this principle as they cropped up in instance after instance over and over again. The Government ought to try once for all to meet the objections urged. The Chancellor of the Exchequer said that when they came to the question of value he should be prepared to leave it an open question and to consider any proposals made. If he did that no doubt it would be a concession, but they had not reached that stage of the Bill yet, and the right hon. Gentleman must forgive the Opposition if they defended, to the best of their ability, the interests they were sent there to represent, and if they pointed out as clearly and emphatically as they could the objections to the Bill, which became plainer and plainer every day.

*MR. EVERETT (Suffolk, Woodbridge)

said, the right hon. Gentleman who had just sat down had rightly described the view of the late Prime Minister that a tax was an engine for depriving people of their property. No doubt it was so; and no doubt a tax was in itself an odious thing. But hon. Gentlemen opposite should remember that it was owing to expenditure on which they insisted that money had to be raised by a tax which was an engine which must deprive people of a portion of their property. It was surprising that hon. Gentlemen could not see that there was no more hardship involved in the State taxing property in land than there was in the State taxing personalty. If the Government must spend money they must find money; and the right hon. Gentlemen opposite and the hon, and gallant Gentleman who had preceded him would find it difficult to explain to an audience why a man with an inheritance of £50,000 in land should be dealt with on more favourable terms than a man with £50,000 in personalty.

COLONEL KENYON-SLANEY

That is, no doubt unintentionally, an absolute misrepresentation of the very essence of what I said. It is hard indeed that a perfectly clear statement cannot be referred to without being turned from black to white. I said that I wished that every farthing invested in realty should be treated in exactly the same way as money invested in personalty. I wish each to be treated on its own merits.

*MR. EVERETT

said, the hon. Member would find it a difficult proposition to support before his constituents, that if an estate of £100,000 consisted one half of real property he was to pay Estate Duty at a less rate than if the whole were personal property.

COLONEL KENYON-SLANEY

said, he pleaded for indulgence. This was the second time the hon. Member had misrepresented him. He never suggested that the owner of real property should pay at a less rate. He suggested emphatically that he should pay at the same rate. He wished to protest against this complete, absolute, and most absurd misrepresentation of what he had said.

*MR. EVERETT

said, the hon, and gallant Gentleman's argument had no meaning at all if it was not that by the dividing of a man's property into two parts they effected the object that a man who really was possessed of £100,000 worth of value had to pay less because it was a divided property than he would do if it consisted of property of but one class. The principle of this Bill was that those who had much should pay much, and no principle of modern times had been more thoroughly endorsed 'by the voice of the country. He recognised the justice of the claim made in this great Budget, and he hoped that the Chancellor of the Exchequer would carry his proposals in spite of the persistent and remarkable opposition with which they had been met from the Benches opposite.

MR. BRODRICK (Guildford, Surrey)

remarked that the hon. Member for the Woodbridge Division had entirely misconceived the nature of the proposition. The view of the hon. Member seemed to be that those hon. Gentlemen who objected to aggregation were therefore asking that a particular form of property should be exempted from taxation, and he appeared to have entirely forgotten that they were proceeding upon estimates which had been provided by the Chancellor of the Exchequer of what would have to be paid by the various owners, whether of personal or real property, and which were simply estimates. The contention of those who supported the Amendment was that a much larger amount than was estimated by the Chancellor of the Exchequer would have to be paid. This would prove exceedingly burdensome whether it fell upon personalty or realty, and, if the constituents of the hon. Member for the Woodbridge Division were able to bear this burden, they were alone among the agricultural constituents of the country in being in that fortunate position. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had himself to thank for Amendments such as the present one. He had been repeatedly asked for statistics as to what would have to be paid by different men under the Bill; and he gave wide figures, running to £4,000,000 or £5,000,000, and refused to substantiate them. When he was told that the figures would be much higher, and would press a particular class more heavily than he supposed, the right hon. Gentleman ignored the suggestion, and refused every Amendment on the ground that it would reduce his income. The right hon. Gentleman declared to-them that land had not paid enough hitherto, that land would in future pay more, but having regard to the depressed condition of agriculture he had assured them that agricultural land would not pay more than £600,000 a year additional, lie (Mr. Brodrick) was not arguing that land should be released from its fair share of taxation, but if he could prove that by aggregation they would make it not £600,000 but £1,200,000 more than it was at present, the Chancellor of the Exchequer was bound to let them have the benefit of that fact, so that when they went before the constituencies of the country they could see whether they did or did not take the view of the Budget that the Member for Woodbridge had so confidently affirmed they did, without anything to guide him in making that assertion. The Chancellor of the Exchequer said that agricultural land would only pay £600,000 more, but he had shown, by figures which he had supplied to the right hon. Gentleman, that in the case of one-tenth of the land assessed it would in itself pay £300,000 more, and he had worked out the figures in a large number of other cases, which proved that there would be a payment by land of three times more than it paid at present over the greater mass of estates that would be aggregated. If that were so, he believed they could very fairly assume that instead of £600,000 the payment extra would be at least £ 1,200,000. Would the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in the present depressed condition of agriculture, say, "So much the better"? If the right hon. Gentleman had under-estimated the payment he could afford to make some concession, and in some form or other the aggregation which produced this excess should be reduced. The right hon. Gentleman was extremely restless on the subject of evadence and avoidance. He thought that nothing produced evasion so much as bad and oppressive law. If the right hon. Gentleman wanted to be sure that his Bill would create a desire for evasion, let him ask solicitors about the instructions they had received from their clients. He had a communication from a solicitor only the previous day in which the solicitor told him he had that day received from a client a cheque for £200, with a letter explaining that, in view of the Government's proposals, he was paying every legacy contained in his will by cheque, and asking that his will should be redrawn, the £200 being the solicitor's share as executor. The solicitor replied that he might not live to execute the will; but his client said that he was bound to reduce the corpus of his personalty, and that in any case he would rather his solicitor had the £200 than the Chancellor of the Excheqner. There was the strongest feeling that this form of aggregation would lead to evasion, and those who were interested in land were concerned at such a prospect, because land would have to bear the heavier burden, and as land was settled property it would be impossible for it to evade the tax. The heavier tax would fall upon the owners of land, for those who had personalty would take the opportunity of evading this tax to the Exchequer, because the Chancellor of the Exchequer in his conduct of the Bill had taken no pains to show that the law would be just, and had left those interested in laud to do the best they could in making out what they knew would be the case—that this tax would operate harshly upon them as contrasted with others.

COMMANDER BETHELL (York, E.R., Holderness)

said, they had heard from the Chancellor of the Exchequer that this Amendment would destroy the principle of graduation. That was the same argument that was used on the previous night, and he maintained that it was entirely unsound. It was perfectly true this Amendment and the Amendment urged on the previous night would, to some extent, modify the operation of graduation, but that it would destroy it was an argument which could not be maintained. It was most unfair, he thought, of the Chancellor of the Exchequer as well as the hon. Member for Woodbridge to urge that his hon. and gallant Friend in this Amendment was arguing in favour of real property as against personal property. The fact was, whatever relief was given to real property under his hon. and gallant Friend's Amendment, precisely the same relief would be given to personal property under later provisions of the Bill. When hon. Gentlemen opposite asked why should a man with £100,000 worth of personal property have to pay more than a man who had £100,000 in two classes of property, the reply was, would not there be the same argument to that if a man had £100,000 in real property—would not he pay more than the man who had £100,000 in personal property? Surely, it cut both ways. This Amendment modified in a certain instance a very drastic proposal, and modified it in a direction which justice demanded. The gentleman who preceded him in debate urged that the condition of landed property was such as to demand some relief of this character, and his hon. Friend justly pointed out that the figures the Chancellor of the Exchequer gave the House with reference to the amount of additional tax to be placed upon real property did not square with the calculations they had been able to make on that side of the House. He (Commander Bethell) had made a calculation, and he had come to nearly the same result as his hon. Friend below him. It was true that neither his hon. Friend nor himself was able to calculate the amount of mortgages throughout the country, but it was quite impossible that the mortgages might come to such an enormous sum as the difference between £500,000, which the Chancellor of the Exchequer told the House would be the additional taxation, and the figure of about £1,300,000, which his hon. Friend and himself had arrived at by different methods of calculation. He thought the House ought to have laid before it figures which would prove the estimates of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. For his part, he considered it most regrettable that in a matter of such huge importance as this the House should be compelled to pass this drastic law without having the elementary figures upon which to found an impartial opinion. The proposals of his hon. Friend were, he thought, just and in the direction of fairness, and upon this ground, if the Amendment went to a Division, he should support it.

*MR. JEFFREYS (Hants, Basingstoke)

said, with reference to the speech of the hon. Member for Woodbridge, he was quite sure it was an indication of the keynote of the speeches that would be made throughout the country with regard to the position the Members of the Opposition had taken up in regard to this Bill. Instead of arguing the matter with the hon. and gallant Member who introduced the Amendment, the hon. Member for Woodbridge made a speech as it he were addressing his constituents in the country, and he said that hon. Gentlemen on that (the Opposition) side of the House wished to free land from Death Duties altogether. They wished to do nothing of the sort. They said that land was overburdened at the present moment, and he was surprised that anybody who had got any knowledge of land like the hon. Member for Woodbridge could deny for a moment that land was overburdened. He thought he had heard the hon. Member say in another place that land was greatly suffering from these burdens, and now he came there and backed up the Chancellor of the Exchequer in placing new charges on the already over-burdened land. All the Amendment provided was that real and personal property should be separated for the purposes of these Death Duties, and that they should not be aggregated.

MR. GIBSON BOWLES (Lynn Regis)

felt bound to confess that this system of two separate aggregations was likely to cause inconvenience. If they once accepted the whole principle of aggregation the aggregation should be one, and consequently he looked with some disfavour on the Amendment. He was bound to say, however, that the example of more than one aggregation had been set by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Clause 3 of the Bill provided for two aggregations, and there was a third aggregation in Clause 6. He questioned the propriety of pressing the Amendment to a Division. There was a vast difference between real and personal property. Whereas personalty was altogether open to the tax levied by the collector, realty, in effect, never could be anything more than its income. Under the circumstances, he would suggest to his hon. and gallant Friend that he should not press his Amendment.

MR. GOSCHEN, (St. George's, Hanover Square)

in the interests of fair play, protested against the construction which had been placed upon the Amendment by the hon. Member for the Wood-bridge Division. It was important that this issue should go fairly and clearly before the country, and that it should not be misrepresented in the manner it had been misrepresented by the hon. Member. What was the Amendment? The Amendment gave no preference whatever to land. It simply asked that realty and personalty should be taken separately; and how, then, could it be said that personalty was to be less well off than realty? If the Amendment was accepted it would except personalty and assist realty, and those who were interested in realty naturally felt an interest in the Amendment, though it would give also a certain relief to personalty. By this Budget realty was hit far harder than personalty, because the moment was chosen both for equalising realty and personalty and increasing the burdens on both when realty had been suffering severely from agricultural depression. Agriculturists had not pushed their case more strenuously than manu- facturers, traders, or bankers. Indeed, when the bankers came to the right hon. Gentleman a concession was readily made to them, and he hoped the Chancellor of the Exchequer would make some concession on the principle of valuation, which was the crux of this case. His hon. Friend was perfectly justified in bringing forward this Amendment, though he admitted that the compromise proposed by his right hon. Friend the Member for West Bristol the previous day did not go so far as the Amendment. But, looking to the feeling of the landed interest in the matter, he was prepared to vote with his hon. Friend if the Amendment was pressed to a Division. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had never seriously dealt with the arguments which had been brought forward on the subject of margin, nor had any information been vouchsafed to the Committee as to how the estimate of the Government had been put so low. His hon. Friend the Member for Surrey had shown that the estimate had been put so low that there would be hundreds of thousands of pounds for which there was a margin. If that was the case, there was room for a concession to be made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

SIR W. HARCOURT

said, be also wished that the issue should be clearly understood here and elsewhere. Hon. Members must not imagine that the public outside were not watching the course of these Debates as well as the speeches of those taking part in them. The right hon. Gentleman said that this Amendment did not favour land.

MR. GOSCHEN

Not more than personalty.

SIR W. HARCOURT

said, they would see. Supposing a man had £100,000 in personalty alone, he would pay on the higher scale; but if he possessed any land, then he would pay on the lower scale. Who would say that this was not giving an advantage to land? The Amendment also gave an advantage to the personalty which the landowner possessed; but it gave no advantage to the man employed in trade or business. No advantage was given by this Amendment, except on one condition—namely, that a man should possess land. The Committee were asked to suppose the case of a man who possessed nothing but realty. But the number of persons were very few of whom it could be said that they had no personal property. [Cries of "Oh, oh!"] What! Not the contents of their houses? A little common-sense was wanted on this subject—a little candour, a little truth. If the Amendment was not a plea in favour of land, what was the meaning of the whole burden of the speech in which it was moved? What was the meaning of the speech of the right hon. Member for Sleaford? The purport of the Amendment was that if a man possessed land, then the whole of his property should be taxed on a lower scale than if a man possessed personalty alone. The whole aim of the Amendment was to keep up the distinction that existed for the purposes of taxation between realty and personalty. Rather than there should be any mistake upon the question he was quite willing to take a Division upon that issue.

MR. GOSCHEN

said, that the argument used by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in support of his contention that land only would gain under this Amendment was so thin that it would not deceive even the most ignorant portion of the community out of doors. The suggestion had been made that it was land only that gained. The right hon. Gentleman had said that no one could be the owner of lands unless he also possessed some personal property as well. It seems to me that this thing is as broad as it is long. I am convinced that realty would not gain more under the terms of the Amendment than personalty would. The object of the Amendment is to afford relief to both personalty and realty alike. No doubt just now realty has been very hardly hit by the continued depression in agriculture, and therefore hon. Members who have landed interests are naturally anxious to get every relief from taxation that they can. It is not fair for all that to say that the object of the Amendment is solely to give some advantage to realty as compared with personalty, and I regret that the Chancellor of the Exchequer should have attacked the Amendment and exhibited its provisions in such an invidious light as he has thought fit to do.

SIR D. MACFARLANE (Argyll)

said, he understood that under the Amendment a very great advantage would be conferred on owners of realty.

COLONEL KENYON-SLANEY

pointed out that the Amendment would only take effect where the party owned two estates of a different character.

*SIR D. MACFARLANE

said, it was quite true that where a man was the owner both of realty and of personalty the same effect would be produced on both. There was no deduction given to a person who had money in Consols, but the owner of realty would receive a substantial deduction. How would the Amendment affect the case of a man who possessed only personalty? Would the advantage that the Amendment was intended to confer on realty come in in that case? So far as he could judge, the Amendment would not act equitably as between the two classes of property.

*SIR J. LUBBOCK (London University)

said, that the right hon. Member for St. George's, Hanover Square, had remarked that the argument of the Chancellor of the Exchequer would not deceive even the most ignorant portion of the community. However true that might be, it seemed to him to have thoroughly confused his hon. Friend the Member for Argyllshire. The Amendment before the Committee was unquestionably one that would afford a relief to the owner of real estate who also possessed personalty of any considerable amount. The converse of this was also true, as it would be equally advantageous to the owner of personalty who had some realty. The Amendment might be right or it might be wrong on other grounds, but there was no question of giving an undue amount of relief from taxation to the one class of ownership at the expense of the other. It was clear, in his opinion, that whatever advantage accrued to the one class of property under the Amendment, the same advantage would also accrue to the other.

MR. BOUSFIELD (Hackney, N.)

said, he thought it would be quite impossible to persuade the Committee that the Amendment would deal out justice to both classes of property alike. The result of the Amendment would be too uncertain and too "fluky" to be of much practical good. In his opinion, it would be found to be more or less inoperative in those cases where some such relief would be most required. It was inequitable that purely agricultural land should be subjected to the same rate of duty as a rich landed estate; but the Amendment made no provision for a case such as that. He hoped that the hon. Member would not press the matter to a Division.

*MR. HENEAGE (Great Grimsby)

said, that before the Committee went to a Division he should like to state the reasons for the vote he should give. Even if he had thought the Chancellor of the Exchequer was right in what he said as to the Amendment, he should still have voted for it all the same, even if he believed that it would do some good to the owners of real property, of which class he, unfortunately, was one. He believed, however, that the arguments given by the Chancellor of the Exchequer were absolutely wrong, and that the Amendment, if carried, would not afford any practical relief to the owners of realty. There was, therefore, no inducement for him to record a selfish vote upon the question.

Question put.

The Committee divided:—Ayes 218; Noes 166.—(Division List, No. 81.)

THE SOLICITOR GENERAL (Mr. R. T. REID) moved to insert, in page 2, line 36, after the word "passing" the words "in which the deceased never had an interest or."

MR. GIBSON BOWLES (Lynn, Regis)

said, he would suggest that there was an oversight here, and that what was intended to imply was "property in which the deceased had not interest at the time of his death."

MR. R. T. REID

said, that perhaps the best course would be to state what would be the effect of the three Amendments that he proposed to move. The Committee would remember that this was wholly a question of aggregation. They were not dealing with the question of taxation. It was wholly under what circumstances were different portions of the property to be aggregated at a man's death? In the first place, it might be his own money that passed. He might have £1,000 in a bank. Or it might be property which had been alienated by him prior to his death. He supposed everybody agreed that all the property coming within that category ought to be aggregated. Then there were three other kinds of property which might pass at his death. There was the property that he might have alienated himself under a settlement during his life preserving an interest to himself; there was property which might pass by the disposition of somebody else in which he had an interest, and there might be property passing by the disposition of somebody else in which he had no interest. There were different kinds of property, and he could not help thinking that there might be some danger of confusion. I propose to deal with and explain how we mean to deal with each of the several classes of property, and then to show how my Amendments carry out those proposals. I have first to deal with property under a settlement made by the deceased himself. We have, of course, to discriminate between those things which are to be in eluded, and those which are not to be included in aggregation. The principle has been already determined on the Amendment of the right hon. Baronet the Member for Bristol (Sir M. Hicks-Beach), that there is to be aggregation between settled property and free property, but without particularising the exceptions that will have to be made. I will first refer to the case of a bonâ fide settlement made by the deceased in which he reserves an interest to himself. The man, who is a father, settles property upon himself for life, with remainder to his son. Upon the death of the father all the property will be aggregated with the father's other property. That is a broad proposition which is, I think, of universal application. If the father had alienated the estate absolutely, reserving no interest to himself but settling it on his son and his son's children, it is, of course, obvious that there would be no aggregation whatever, because there would be no duty payable. Now, I come to a case in which property passes on the death of the deceased by virtue of a settlement or disposition made by somebody else, and in which the deceased had no interest. I will give an example. A father settles property upon a son for his life, with remainder to the son's widow and children, and other remainders over. If the son on his death leaves a widow and children there is aggregation, and that seems fair enough. That is a case in which the property was intended to descend in the family, and did so be- cause the settlement in favour of the son and his children was effective. But suppose the case put, I think, by the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. A. J. Balfour) on the Second Reading—suppose the son left no children at all, and the property would, under the settlement, go away to a stranger, or a cousin, or some other collateral—it would then be unfair to aggregate property which goes away entirely from the family. In that case, therefore, there is no aggregation. There is a further provision necessary. Supposing that a portion only of the property, which was settled by the father, goes to the son's widow and children, and a portion goes away to collaterals or strangers, there will then be aggregation only to the extent to which the property does go to the widow and children. I have endeavoured to make the matter as clear as I can; but, of course, from the very nature of the case, it is not a very easy thing to deal with. The gist of the thing, however, is this: that if the settlement was made by some other person than the deceased, and the death of the deceased is merely a signal for the passing of the property to some strange person, there is no aggregation; whereas if the result of the death is to continue the benefit to the deceased's wife or children there is aggregation. There is one other case to deal with—the case in which the settlement was made by someone else than the deceased, who never had any interest in it. Suppose a father is dissatisfied with the conduct of his married son and settles his property upon himself for life and then upon his grandchildren, giving no interest to his son at all. In that case, on the death of the son there will be no aggregation, because nothing will be payable. The latter part of the clause as we propose to amend it will run as follows:— Provided that any property so passing in which the deceased never had an interest, or which under a disposition not made by the deceased passes immediately on his death to some person other than the wife, husband or descendant of the deceased shall not he aggregated with any other property, but shall be an estate by itself, and the Estate Duty shall be levied at the proper graduated rate on the principal value thereof, but if any interest in the property so passing to some other person is reserved or given to the wife, or husband, or a descendant of the deceased, such interest shall be aggregated with property of the deceased for the purpose of determining the rate of Estate Duty. I must make my acknowledgments to the hon. and learned Members for York (Mr. Butcher) and Essex (Mr. Byrne), who have put down Amendments which are extremely suggestive. We have taken the liberty, which I think they will not resent, of using some of the phrases which they have most aptly employed. I have now explained the method in which aggregation is proposed to be dealt with, and I may say that the present Amendment deals with a matter which is, I think, quite non-controversial. If there be any controversial matter it will arise later on. I have stated what I think is the general scope of the clause because I think that course may be for the convenience of the Committee, and not because I think it necessary to justify the Government in accepting the Amendments they have accepted.

Amendment proposed, in page 2, line 36, after the word "passing" to insert the words "in which the deceased never had an interest or."—(Mr. R. T. Reid).

Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."

*SIR R. WEBSTER (Isle of Wight)

said, he thought the Committee were very much indebted to the hon. and learned Gentleman for having given them an opportunity of saying whether they thought the proposals of the Government went far enough or not. He wished to know whether it was not proposed to deal with a case in which property settled by a man on his son until the latter attained a certain age or came into other property reverted to the settlor owing to the death of the son?

MR. R. T. REID

said, that was not aggregation.

SIR R. WEBSTER

said, that if the hon. and learned Gentleman did not consider that it should be dealt with on this clause he would say no more about it. The Amendment said "in which the deceased never had an interest," but he was not certain that the right words would not be "in which the deceased had no interest at the time of his death." If they took the case of property settled on one side with remainder on deceased's death on the other side it ought not to be aggregated. He mentioned this in order that the hon. and learned Gentleman might use language to carry out his own intention.

MR. GIBSON BOWLES

said, he would move to amend the Amendment by substituting the words "had no interest at the time of his death" for the words "never had an interest." A man might have had property in which he had divested himself of all interest long before his death, therefore that should not be brought in as part of the aggregation.

MR. R. T. REID

said, the words he proposed included those of the hon. Member. He would consider the point raised if the words were left over.

MR. GIBSON BOWLES

said, he had every desire to facilitate the extremely arduous task in which the Solicitor General was engaged. This was the most complicated clause in the Bill as regarded its effect. As he understood the hon. and learned Gentleman to say that he would entertain the objection on Report, he (Mr. Gibson Bowles) would not press his Amendment.

MR. MATTHEWS (Birmingham, E.)

urged that property in which a man only had a life interest should not be dealt with as his property, even though the remainder was in favour of his family. How could it reasonably be said that a sum of money was a man's property which never had been his, in which he had only a life interest, and the disposition of which he could not alter? Where a man had only a life interest in a sum of money settled by somebody else it ought not to be considered his property, and therefore ought not to be included in the aggregation at the time of his death. They had agreed last night, in the case referred to by the hon. and learned Gentleman, that the property was to pay Death Duty on the death of the father, the settlor. Now, however, the Solicitor General was proposing that when the son died the property should be aggregated again.

MR. R. T. REID

said, that if the SOB divested himself of all interest in the property on the father's death no duty was payable, but it became a settled estate, and at one period during the con- tinuance of the settlement duty was payable. It would be fixed as a payment on the third life.

MR. COURTNEY (Cornwall, Bodmin)

said, he wished to put the case of a man possessed of two estates. During his lifetime he settled, for his life, the inferior of the two estates on his eldest son. The eldest son was in possession. Then he devised the reversion of the principal estate and of the first estate by his will, giving the larger estate to his eldest son and passing on the inferior estate to his eldest son's son, and providing that on the death of his eldest son the superior estate should pass to the eldest son's son and the inferior estate to the eldest son's second son. [Laugter.] He did not know whether this illustration was clearly followed. It would be observed that on the death of the eldest son both estates passed, and the question was, should both those estates be aggregated to ascertain what passed on the death of the eldest son. If a proviso was put in containing the words "had no interest at the time of his death," then the inferior estate would not be aggregated. But if the words were limited to "never had an interest," both would be aggregated.

MR. GIBSON BOWLES

said, that his hon. Friend had assumed, in the case of a settlement having been made, that the settlor was to be supposed to have disposed of his property by will, but if he did that he would still at the time of his death be interested, and he would therefore be brought within the words.

MR. COURTNEY

said, the question would not arise on the death of the first settlor, but on the decease of the eldest son.

MR. GIBSON BOWLES

begged the right hon. Gentleman's pardon in pointing out that the question arose on the death of the "deceased"; it was the person contemplated by the will of the deceased taking an interest under the will. The whole matter was therefore brought at once within the words of the clause, the settlement having been made without any remainders over. It was really a very simple matter, although it seemed so complicated.

Question put, and agreed to.

*MR. BUTCHER (York)

moved an Amendment to exempt from aggregation under the provisions of the Bill property passing upon a person's death under settlements made by strangers. He argued that such property could not be viewed as forming part of the aggregate wealth of the deceased, who had never had any power to dispose of it, and who might have had only a very limited temporary interest in it. The proposal of the Government would cause grievous injustice in many cases. Take as an illustration the case of a man dying worth £5,000 which he left to his widow by will, she would have to pay duty amounting to £150. But supposing, to the misfortune of the widow, some stranger should have settled a large amount of property—say £100,000—upon the husband for his life with remainder to his son, the whole of this vast property would be aggregated with the £5,000 passing to the widow, with the result that she would have to pay some £300 duty, instead of £150, although she would benefit in no way under the settlement. That was only one example of a number of cases which might arise. The general result of the plan of the Government would be that a person having an interest under a will would have to pay a far larger share of duty than he otherwise would, whenever a stranger had been generous to other members of the family, and had settled money on the deceased for his life with remainder over to his son. As another illustration he would take the case of a rent-charge, in which a much worse example of injustice would arise. A man died leaving all his property, £5,000, to his widow. Supposing that a complete stranger, instead of settling a large property worth £100,000 upon the deceased with remainder to his son, had given the deceased a rent-charge of £50 a year issuing out of a sum of £100,000. Although it was so settled that it passed at the husband's death to his son, the widow would have under the system of aggregation to pay increased duty, although the only interest of her husband in the property was the rent-charge of £50. It had been argued by the Solicitor General that where a settlement was made by a father upon his son for the son's life and then upon the son's children, the grandchildren of the settlor took from their father, and that therefore it was reasonable that the property should be aggregated. But, as a matter of fact, in such cases the grandchildren did not take from their father, but from the settlor, the grandfather, and the property so taken ought not to be aggregated with the property of which the father had power to dispose. These were cases of extreme hardship, and they should be dealt with in fairness, so as to distinguish property passing under such circumstances. He maintained that property settled by a stranger should not be aggregated with property passing under a will made by another person, or with property settled by another person. For those reasons he asked the Committee to accept the Amendment.

Amendment proposed, in page 2, line 36, after the word "which," to insert the words— not being property of which the deceased was, at the time of his death, competent to dispose, passes."—(Mr. Butcher.)

Question proposed, "That those words J be there inserted."

SIR W. HARCOURT

(who was very imperfectly heard) was understood as explaining that the general proposal of the Government was that all property which a man could dispose of by settlement or by will should be aggregated. They accepted, however, to a certain extent the principle that property not settled or disposed of by the deceased, although passing at his death, ought not to be aggregated. The proposal was, in fact, to apply what might be called cy-pré doctrine in these matters. The purpose of the Bill was that settlements which were family settlements, such as those made by parents upon children, should be aggregated, but that those which were not family settlements should not be aggregated. Where a life interest was given, passing directly at death to children, it should be treated as though it were property of the deceased, which after his decease became the property of his children. Otherwise it would be ex- tremely easy to evade the payment of duty by making settlements of that kind. The hon. Member had used the word "stranger" in supporting the Amendment. Under the Amendment it would be extremely easy for the family solicitor, by making settlements of a particular character or of the kind contemplated by the Amendment, to evade the principle of aggregation altogether. Allusion had been made to the sources of information obtained by the Exchequer for the purpose of preventing evasions of the tax; but if that were attempted no complaint could be made against those who were responsible for the Revenue if they resorted to means to prevent the evasion being made. He could not accept the Amendment.

MR. MATTHEWS

was glad the Committee were to have the assistance of the Solicitor General in the procedure of the discussion, for he was both candid and open, using fair arguments himself and treating fairly the arguments of others. Hon. Members were justified in complaining of the way in which the Chancellor of the Exchequer met the arguments and cases that were put by Members of the Opposition to show the injustice and unworkable character of the Bill. Instead of giving a serious reply to the objections urged, the right hon. Gentleman had, in his usual fashion, indulged in taunts or in remarks that were utterly irrelevant to the subject under discussion. He had used offensive epithets and had employed old Norman-French legal phrases which were not intelligible in connection with this Bill, combined with equally unintelligible phrases for this purpose in indifferent Latin. The cy-prés doctrine had no application here at all, and was confined to something entirely different. It had reference to charitable bequests only, and this certainly was the first time he had ever heard of cy-prés taxation. He had just flung in their faces the family solicitor, and if anyone were tempted to retaliate by saying that "the Bill had been hatched and contrived by the wire-puller and the election agent," the remark would be just as courteous and pertinent. Under the Bill as it stood property of which a man at the time of his death had entirely dispossessed himself would be aggregated, and no reasonable principle was laid down with regard to evasion. It surely was not intended by the Bill that the Exchequer should claim duty upon property which a father had given away to his son during his life, which when he died was to be made liable to duty by being aggregated with the rest of his own property. Take the case of a settlement of £100,000—personalty, not realty, for that always exasperated hon. Members on the other side of the House—settled upon a son for life, then passing to the son's wife, and then to their children. The son would never have any other property in it than the interest which expired with his life, but the Government were treating that £100,000 as property which was passed by him on his decease, and they contended that it ought to be aggregated with the rest of his property which he left at his death. He could see no difference in the case of the wife and the case of the husband. It might be cy-prés or constructive law to call that the property of the son, but it never was his to give away; he could never part with a sixpence of it; he had nothing in it but a life interest, and all his interest expired at his death. He thought the Exchequer could afford to wait until the property passed into the hands of somebody who could dispose of it before they sought to aggregate it. To aggregate with a man's estate a property in which he had never had anything but a life interest was to disregard the plain facts of the case.

MR. R. T. REID

said that, according to the right hon. Gentleman, property under settlement should escape during the whole duration of the settlement. The right hon. Gentleman had shown the extreme necessity for the greatest precaution and care in dealing with matters of this kind, because even a gentleman familiar with these subjects propounded a doctrine that would enable every single piece of property under settlement to escape Estate Duty.

MR. MATTHEWS

Only if settled by a stranger.

MR. R. T. REID

And the stranger the man's father. The intention of the Government was that if property came from strangers and went to strangers— and they made a large interpretation of the term "stranger"—there would be no aggregation; but if it went into the bulk of the property which passed upon the death of a man to the extent to which it did, and no further, it paid duty, and was then relieved from further payment during the existence of the settlement.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

said that, so far as he was concerned, the doctrine laid down to-day by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the doctrine laid down to-day by the Solicitor General, and by both of them on previous days, placed him in a state of great mental confusion. The original doctrine of the Bill was that any property which a man enjoyed, whether he could dispose of it at his death, or had merely the income for life, was equally his property and should be aggregated, and the graduated taxation in both cases be taken on the cumulative amount. That was the old doctrine; but now the Chancellor of the Exchequer came down with a new doctrine, and his new doctrine was this: that property over which a man had no disposal was not, indeed, his property in the full sense of the word, and should not be aggregated. The Government, however, said very large exceptions had to be made to that general principle, and the chief exception was that when settled property passed either to the wife or lineal descendants it ought to be aggregated. These two doctrines were absolutely inconsistent with each other, and they wished to know by which doctrine the Government stood? Neither doctrine was carried out consistently in the Bill. He did not agree that a man could not call that his property of which he could not dispose. He did not feel that the principal privilege of property was to leave it to somebody else. But, on the other hand, to say a man enjoyed precisely the same privilege with regard to property of which he could dispose, and property of which he could not dispose, was an extravagance in the opposite direction. Therefore, if his hon. Friend went too far in one direction in saying that property which a man held under settlement should not be aggregated, the Government were equally leaving the strict path of equity in saying that in whatever form a man enjoyed property he should be taxed. The Government by their vacillations on these points showed that they knew their own plan would not bear examination. It was quite evident that they saw they could not drive either of the two inconsistent doctrines on which they relied to its logical extreme. If they wanted to embody a sound principle in their Bill they must find some other way of dealing with the question.

MR. BANBURY (Camberwell, Peckham)

said, this Amendment touched the question which he asked the Solicitor General last night, and upon which the hon. and learned Gentleman said he would give him some answer to-day. If he read the Bill correctly, the tax imposed in some cases would be larger than the property that passed, and he did not think that could be the intention of the Government.

MR. R. T. REID

said, the hon. Member would find the matter was dealt with under Clause 17.

Question put.

The Committee divided:—Ayes 94; Noes 130.—(Division List, No. 82.)

*MR. GRANT LAWSON

said, in the Amendment he was now about to propose there was nothing technical. They had followed the last discussion with some difficulty, but there would be no difficulty in following this, as it simply provided that whoever made the disposition, the children's bread was not to be aggregated with the money that was cast to the dogs. The Amendment was one that would be easily understood. He did not desire to encourage people to leave their money away from their own families, and he was certain there was a strong, a natural, desire to benefit their own people, and not to make dispositions that would deprive such persons of property, even for the laudable desire of depriving the Exchequer of a certain amount of revenue. What he said was that if money was left away from the family they should not add to the injury so done to that family the additional injury of making them pay a large sum of money again, by the increased rate, on the remnant which came to them. As the clause stood at present, suppose a disposition was made by which the bulk of the money would go away to charity, yet its shadow would remain for the purpose of increasing the rate on the money which went to the children. Money might be left for a good object, but it might go to bad objects such as was indicated by the Member for King's Lynn the other night. Was it desirable that money going in those unpleasant directions should increase the charge upon the children? What went to the family should not escape duty, but it should be aggregated by itself and charged at a rate appropriate to such aggregation. He hoped the Government would see their way to accept the Amendment, or at any rate would give it their serious consideration. He begged to move the Amendment.

Amendment proposed, in page 2, line 36, to leave out the words "under a disposition not made by the deceased."—(Mr. Grant Lawson.)

Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause."

SIR W. HARCOURT

said, the Amendment amounted to this: that if a man owned property and left it to his children it should not be aggregated, but that if he left it to anybody else it should be aggregated, as he understood it. That was a most extraordinary proposition. He thought they had admitted that what a man had got was to be aggregated. The hon. Member now asked that property should be treated in one way if it was left to the children, and in quite a different way if it was left to a charity. That would impose a fiscal disability, and would deprive a man of that liberty of leaving property as he pleased which he enjoyed under the English law. The proposition really was that a man was to be placed in a more disadvantageous position if he left his property to whomsoever he pleased than the man who left it to his wife and children. He could not think that the Committee would agree to any such proposal.

MR. BARTLEY

thought his hon. Friend's Amendment would rather tend to promote legacies to charities and other purposes, because it would take out of the estate such bequests as came under the form of charities, and so on. There would be an encouragement to do that, inasmuch as all sums left that way would not be aggregated, and it would so tend to reduce the Estate Duty paid by the descendants of the testator. He did not know that that was the intention of the alteration, or that that was the right way of encouraging charities, and he would advise his hon. Friend not to press the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

On Motion of Mr. T. H. BOLTON, the following Amendment was agreed to: —Page 2, line 37, leave out "his death," and insert "the death of the deceased."

On Motion of Mr. GIBSON BOWLES, the following Amendment was agreed to: —Page 2, line 38, after "husband," insert "lineal ancestor or lineal."

MR. E. T. REID moved an Amendment in line 39, to leave out the words— Without any benefit being reserved or given to any of them. The purpose, he explained, was to provide that the aggregation should only be extended if benefit was derived.

Amendment agreed to.

On Motion of Mr. E. T. RBID, the following Amendment was agreed to:—Page 2, line 39, leave out from the beginning to "shall."

*MR. GRANT LAWSON moved, in page 2, line 39, after "them," insert— Or which passes under any settlement made in contemplation of marriage, where the ultimate succession to such property falls upon the child or children of the marriage, or their descendants. He said, he had been asked to move this Amendment on behalf of a good many Societies that dealt with reversions. If these trust funds were to be mixed up and aggregated with other property it would be impossible to tell what rate of duty would be payable upon them or upon any property passing to them when they fell into possession. It would render it impossible for children who had property charged under marriage settle- ments to deal with their portions in the way of selling their reversionary interests unless they went to a money-lender. At the present moment under marriage settlements, when portions were charged for children and when these portions were vested, they could go to well-known Societies and get an ascertainable amount for their reversionary interest. The reason of that was that the present Death Duties were fixed in their amount, and it was well known what would have to be paid by the Reversionary Companies when the properties fell into their possession; but if they had aggregations of money under trusts of this description, with other property of an absolutely unknown amount dependent upon what the deceased happened to leave in any form of property, it would be impossible for the ordinary calculations in these commercial transactions to be made, as they would never know at what rate the duty would be assessed. If money passing under marriage settlements were kept distinct from other property the amount would be known, and everything applicable to the rate of interest on the settlements would be known. The Chancellor of the Exchequer appeared to view all marriage settlements as things to be discouraged and as a fraud upon the Exchequer. He did not think that was the view of the Committee, and in order to test whether it was or not he begged to move the Amendment.

Amendment proposed, in page 2, line 39, after the word "them," to insert the words— Or which passes under any settlement made in contemplation of marriage, where the ultimate succession to such property falls upon the child or children of the marriage, or their descendants."—(Mr. Grant Lawson.)

Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."

MR. R. T. REID

said, the hon. Member had asked that no marriage settlements should be included. They had already debated, discussed, and decided the question relating to marriage settlements, and yet the Amendment of the hon. Member would affect settlements, nine-tenths of which would be marriage settlements. Under those circumstances, it was not necessary for him to deal with cases of difficulty in estimating the value of reversions. The Amendment would strike at the root of all settlements being aggregated. On the question of reversions, it was always difficult to estimate the value of reversions, and it must necessarily be a difficult matter, whether the reversion arose out of a marriage settlement or not. The difficulty, however, he should imagine, was of no importance to the Insurance Companies, because there was always a margin, and the margin they had to provide for was exceedingly small. It was impossible to accept the Amendment, as that would be going back upon the decision arrived at by the Committee the previous night.

*MR. T. H. BOLTON

said, there was one important subject which the Government ought to consider, and that was the practical difficulty there would be in dealing with certain property under settlement in consequence of the uncertainty as to the amount of duty to be paid. Of course, when unsettled property was aggregated with settled property as proposed in the Bill, the rate of duty on settlement property would be very uncertain. That was to say, that whereas a settlement if kept by itself would carry only a duty of 3 or 4 per cent., the rate if it came to be aggregated as proposed might be very greatly increased. The Solicitor General said there was always a margin when an Insurance Company lent on reversions. But that provision was not altogether applicable to all cases. It was a not uncommon thing for Insurance Companies to purchase portions of reversions. He himself, the other day, sold for a client so much of a reversion as was equivalent in value to £1,000 paid down. The Insurance Company gave £1,000 and took the portion of the reversion and calculated on a certain rate of duty. The proposal of the Government, however, would introduce an element of uncertainty, and interfere with that mode of dealing with reversions. It would place people who had to sell reversionary interests in considerable embarrassment; it would embarrass the Insurance Companies, and would also depreciate the value of reversionary property as a mar- ketable property to be dealt with. He did not raise this as against the principle of aggregation, but he was suggesting a practical difficulty that arose in connection with this principle of aggregation, and which he hoped the Government would seriously consider. He did not know any subject dealt with in this Bill which required more careful consideration than the bearings of this principle of aggregation. He agreed with the hon. Member for Thirsk, and he supported him in pressing these matters upon the consideration of the Committee.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

said, his hon. Friend who had moved this Amendment had undoubtedly raised a question which was a larger one than that which was covered by the first argument he addressed to the Committee. This Amendment did undoubtedly strike at marriage settlements paying this duty, and the contention of the Solicitor General that they had the previous night discussed at length that considerable question and taken the decision of the House upon it, or a somewhat nearly allied subject, ought not to be lost sight of in this discussion. But he did not think it was quite sufficient satisfaction to them to be told that because the Committee had decided that marriage settlements should not go outside the aggregation that, therefore, having so decided they were not to try and remedy that very practical grievance which the two hon. Gentlemen who had spoken had brought to the notice of the Committee. It had been pointed out that the Insurance Companies would not know upon what security they were lending; they would be in doubt up to the last moment as to what the Estate Duty would be upon the reversion that was their security, and the result of that was that a loss would accrue to these Insurance Companies in carrying out one of the most legitimate and important parts of their ordinary transactions. What was the learned Solicitor General's reply? He said that there was a sufficient margin to cover not only the existing Death Duties, but also this Estate Duty, and any variation or alteration in the Estate Duty that might result from the fact that the deceased might leave a larger property at his death than was anticipated by the Insurance Company that entered into the transaction. He could not believe that argument was a good one. Everybody knew that the competition now between the Insurance Companies in this country and America was so keen that they were so fighting with each other for business that the margin of profit was cut down to the very narrowest limits, and though he fully believed the Insurance Companies would in the long run know how to protect themselves they would do so at the cost of the unfortunate person who had got to borrow. A person, from the very fact that he had got to borrow, might be presumed to be in necessitous circumstances; and if the Insurance Companies were going to protect themselves it must be at the cost of the individual who borrowed; and if they were going to leave such a margin in all these transactions that they were to be ensured from loss, they would guard themselves from that loss at the cost of the unfortunate individual who wished to sell to them his reversionary interest. This was one of those collateral objections to the plan of the Government which that plan bristled with at every turn and which showed how extremely difficult it would be to work this Bill in practice, and how it would inflict great hardship upon the most unexpected classes in the community. Suppose that one of the classes injured by it was the Insurance Offices or those who dealt with them, it was perfectly evident that the class would suffer most unmerited injury simply because the Government were determined to carry out this unfortunate principle of aggregation. He should not advise the hon. Member to press his Amendment, because it covered more than the principal subject which he had brought forward. But if the hon. Member could devise some other plan by which Insurance Companies and their clients should be protected from loss, he hoped he would do so, as he should be glad to support him. If that should be impossible, as he feared it might be, they should have no resource but to deal with the subject on the clause itself, and one of the objections necessarily incident to the plan the Government had adopted could then only be got rid of by cutting to the root of the evil and getting rid of the principle of aggregation altogether.

SIR W. HARCOURT

remarked that the right hon. Gentleman appeared to lose sight of the fact that the purchase of a reversion was the purchase of an uncertainty, and that Insurance Offices always took care to protect themselves against that uncertainty. What uncertainties were there in this matter that were comparable with those great uncertainties which were of the essence of reversions?

MR. BYRNE

said, the risk which the purchaser of a reversion ran was an insurable risk; but the great difficulty of the aggregation of reversions arising under settlements was that it might be 20, 30, or 50 years before it was known what rate of duty was going to be payable. In the case of an ordinary personal estate settlement, the settlement might be for the life of the father with remainder for the children; and as the life might be a long one, the children might want to deal with their reversions. But as the duty on the reversions could not be ascertained until the father's death— it might be 20 years after and he might then die a millionaire, when there would be a high duty, or a bankrupt when there would be no duty—the children must be satisfied with a less price for their reversions, for the purchaser would calculate on a high duty being payable. In the case of real estate, the difficulty that would be brought in by the proposals of the Government would prevent that which they all desired—namely, the free and easy disposition of land. These were difficulties which the Government ought to take into consideration.

MR. R. T. REID

said, the Amendment did not meet the points to which his right hon. and learned Friend had referred. He did not know what way there might be to meet the point, but the Government would consider what could be done in the matter.

MR. GRANT LAWSON

said, he was obliged to the Solicitor General for his promise. Before he withdrew the Amendment he would suggest as a way out of the difficulty that the Commissioners should have power to fix a rate on the settlement calculated on a rough estimate of the amount of money held by the settlor at the time of the settlement.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

MR. BYRNE

said, he had on the Paper to insert, in line 40, after "shall," the words "if otherwise liable to Estate Duty;" but he did not intend to move it, as somewhat similar words had been already introduced into the clause. He thought, however, that the clause needed further strengthening in the direction of making it clear that no property but property liable to Estate Duty should be aggregated.

MR. R. T. REID

said, he thought there could be no doubt that no property could be aggregated but property that was liable to Estate Duty. If there was anything wrong it would be remedied on Report, but he felt confident that there was nothing wrong.

MR. BYRNE

said, he felt that, for clearness sake, it would be necessary to improve the phraseology of the clause; but he was quite content to leave the matter in the hands of the Solicitor General.

Amendment proposed in page 2, line 42, at end, add— but if any interest in the property so passing under a disposition made by the deceased is reserved or given to the wife, or husband, or a descendant of the deceased, such interest shall be aggregated with property of the deceased for the purpose of determining the rate of Estate Duty."—(Mr. R. T. Reid.)

Question proposed, "That, those words be there added."

*MR. T. H. BOLTON

suggested that the word "benefit" should be substituted for "interest" in the Amendment.

MR. R. T. REID

said, he was quite willing to accept the alteration.

MR. BUTCHER

said, that in consequence of the acceptance by the Solicitor General of an Amendment moved by the hon. Member for King's Lynn, it would be necessary to insert, after "husband" in the Amendment, the words "or lineal ancestor, or lineal descendant."

MR. R. T. REID

said, that was so, and he thanked the hon. and learned Member for the reminder.

Amendment proposed, in page 2, line 42, at end, add— but if any benefit in the property so passing under a disposition made by the deceased is reserved or given to the wife, or husband, or lineal ancestor, or lineal descendant of the deceased, such benefit shall be aggregated with property of the deceased for the purpose of determining the rate of Estate Duty."—(Mr. R. T. Reid.)

Question, "That those words be there inserted," put, and agreed to.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Clause, as amended, stand pare of the Bill."

MR. AMBROSE

said, the Chancellor of the Exchequer had made as the foundation of his claim for the proposed new duties the title of the State to deal with the property of the deceased man. That claim had been assented to; but the property that should be dealt with by the State was property the man died possessed of, and not property that belonged to anybody else. Clause 3 drew within itself Clauses 1 and 2; and they, therefore, would have to go back to those clauses in order to ascertain what was the property which, according to the Bill, passed at death. He should have thought that clause was amply sufficient. It provided that Estate Duty should be paid on real and personal property, settled or unsettled, that passed at the death of the deceased. There could be no doubt about those words. They referred to property of which the deceased himself was the owner, and not to any other property. But the Government were not content with the principle of the Bill as set forth in Clause 1; for if they had been content with the principle of the Bill they would never have inserted Clauses'2 and 3. Clause 2, for the purposes of Clause 3, proceeded, not to define Clause 1—which the Chancellor of the Exchequer had said was its sole object—but to extend it. It set out the property that should be held to have passed at a man's death. Of course, in so far as a man was dealing with his own property, he was competent to dispose of it, and there could be no objection to dealing with such property; but those clauses were intended to include men who might have a general power of appointment sufficient to render him liable to Probate Duty. Cases like the following often happened. A testator in making his will might have some doubt or difficulty as to events which he could not quite anticipate, but were possible. For instance, in the case of a daughter he might be disposed to leave the property to her for life, and, if married, to her children after her death; but if not married, or if married being without children, he might bring some executor into the will to see that the property went to somebody else after her death. Again, to take another case, a man might not feel himself capable to make a will, and he might leave to a friend the disposition of his property after death. Was it right that such men, who were made a sort of arbitrator in those cases, should have the property left to their charge in this manner mixed up with their own personal property, and duty charged on it as if it formed part of their own estate? And yet that was what Clauses 2 and 3 enacted.

MR. CALDWELL (Lanark, Mid)

rose to Order. He understood that the Question before the Committee was that Clause 3 stand part of the Bill.

THE CHAIRMAN

That is so. The hon. Member will not be in Order in discussing Clause 2.

MR. AMBROSE

said, the question he was dealing with arose under Clause 3, and he was but referring to Clauses 1 and 2 for the purposes of illustration. He had no objection to the Succession Duties. He had no idea of raising any difficulty with regard to them, but they should be confined to their proper sphere. There was even a stronger case than the case of the power of appointment to which he had alluded. In the case of property granted to A during the life of H, and passing on B's death to C, there would be a liability to Estate Duty on B's property under Clause 2 and to aggregation under Clause 3. B had no interest whatever in the property; and what sense or reason could there be in mixing up that property with B's own property on his death? It was a mere accident that B's name was made use of in the instrument to determine when A's interest ended and C's interest began; and yet under the Bill that property would be aggregated with B's own property. The thing was absolute nonsense. He had abstained from indulging in any verbal criticism of the Bill, because he went for the principle rather than for the phraseology of the measure. The whole principle of the Bill was wrong. He had tried to amend the Bill; he had gone to the trouble of drafting Amendments with a view to improving the Bill, but he found that Amendments only made it worse. He therefore thought it was not worth while to occupy the time of the Committee with Amendments, and he opposed instead the principle of the Bill, which appeared to him to be utterly wrong. He entirely endorsed a statement which had been made by the Secretary of State for India. The right hon. Gentleman said that the estate of a deceased person was rarely or never divided until the accounts had been passed at Somerset House. But what followed from that? That the people who were seeking their legacies would be kept out of them for an indefinite time. Parliament and the Courts of Law had been struggling to remedy the delays in the administration of estates; and the evils which did exist some years ago —evils of which Dickens had treated in Bleak House—now no longer remained. But if all these inquiries which the Bill demanded were to be instituted —and the inquiries of Somerset House were most inquisitive—and if executors had to answer questions about property with which they had nothing to do, how was any estate to be wound up at all? The Government in these proposals was dealing a death-blow to the cause of law reform. What was the use of attempting the simplification of land transfer when all these difficulties, which neither the lawyers nor the Courts could grapple with, were being created? It had been said by the Chancellor of the Exchequer that the objections which had been raised to the Bill were objections in the interests of the great landed gentry. He left the defence of the lauded gentry to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for the right hon. Gentleman had more associations with that class than he had lie had the honour of appearing for the humbler classes, who had a right to be heard in Parliament. It was time that the public understood what this question was. The Government were inflicting an injury ten thousand times greater than any gain which they could hope to recover. The expense of conducting these inquiries, set against the trifling sum to be realised by these proposals, would make the game not worth the candle.

THE CHAIRMAN

pointed out that the hon. and learned Gentleman was going beyond the limits of the subject under discussion.

MR. AMBROSE

said, that his point was that this system of aggregation would cost more to the persons who had to pay the duty than the Revenue would gain by it. In these circumstances, he should heartily support the Motion for the rejection of the clause.

*MR. HENEAGE (Great Grimsby)

said, he was glad that the hon. and learned Member for Thirsk had moved the rejection of this clause, because his doing so had brought hon. Members face to face with the revolutionary proposals of the Government. His objection to the clause was not so much against aggregation, as aggregation coupled with aggregation, which was, in his opinion, a most injurious principle. The argument had been used against them that whenever they spoke they were standing up for the millionaire or the bloated landed interest. He did not consider that that could be said in this case; and, as a fact, there was no reason at all to go to the millionaire or the great properties, because the defects of this tax could just as well be pointed out, and more effectively, in regard to the small estates. This clause dealt with the small estates and the savings of working men, the earnings of the professional man, and the reward of enterprise and labour of the whole body of industrial and thrifty persons, its object being to artificially increase the amount of duty to be collected. Let them take the case of the breadwinner of a family. An artizan died, leaving £500 to his wife and six children. Neither of these beneficiaries would receive so much as £100, but the money would be aggregated in order to compel them to pay 2 per cent, under Clause 14. Or take the case of a middle-class man, a business man. Say he started originally as a comparatively poor man and worked his way up and accumulated through hard work and self-sacrifice some £10,000 or £12,000, having brought up a family of three or four sons and daughters. He might place his sons in various businesses, retaining to himself the control of the capital. When he died he left to his children the capital with which they had been carrying on business. Each would receive a sum varying from £2,000 to £4,000, but they would have to pay an accumulated duty to twice the amount of what was actually due upon the capital that each of them received. The brothers would have no interest at all in the capital passing, except so far as his own share was concerned, but nevertheless would have to pay upon the whole. When the division of the capital took place one of them might have to repay some amount which had been advanced to him by the father to keep his business going, but he would also have to pay upon the whole amount. He did not object to aggregation and assimilation, but aggregation and graduation would undoubtedly bring about evil results. Again, in the case of a widow and five or six children taking £25,000 or £30,000 under the will of a professional man, instead of paying 3 or 4 per cent, they would have to pay 6 per cent. They had been told that certain principles had been laid down and that the Government could not go away from them. The Government might say that, but the duty of the Opposition was, at all events, to see that those principles were fair. The Government in the first three clauses of the Bill were seeking to effect an enormous revolution in finance, and they defended their proposals on the ground that they wanted money. Surely the Government were hound to defend their Bill upon its merits and not upon the ground of their own necessities. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had said that the country was in favour of the Budget, but he was not so sure that the country was so sweet upon it. He came into contact with a good many people, and the only person he had heard speak in favour of the Government proposals was a man who had expressed his thankfulness that, a 2d. additional Income Tax had not been proposed, while as for the Death Duties our successors would have to pay them. The agricultural labourers were beginning to find out what would be the effect of these proposals. [A lauyh.] Hon. Gentlemen might laugh, but he, at least, knew as much about these matters as they did. They knew perfectly well what these transactions would lead to— that the estates would be broken up, and that money which now went in the keeping up and improvement of property must be parted with in taxation. What was to become of the artizan?

THE CHAIRMAN

I do not think this bears upon the question of aggregation.

*MR. HENEAGE

said, he was endeavouring to show that aggregation would have the effect of taking money out of the pockets of those who paid for labour. The consequence would be that many would have to part with many estate labourers whom they now employed. He should, therefore, support the Motion of his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Thirsk, and he hoped he would press it to a Division.

SIR R. WEBSTER

said, he could not allow the clause to pass without entering his protest against the principles which were involved in the aggregation of property as contemplated in the Bill. He hoped his prediction might turn out wrong; but having seen something of the working of the Death Duties during the last few years, and knowing something of the winding-up of debt-encumbered estates, he could not help thinking that this principle of aggregation would lead to such delays, such uncertainties, and such difficulties between persons who were liable to pay, and persons who on behalf of the Government charged the duty, that any advantages which might arise from the operation of the Bill would be neutralised. His objection, however, went still deeper. He had endeavoured on previous occasions to enforce on the Government the view that if this principle of aggregation was to be carried out it should be according to the amount of property in the hands of those who received, and not according to the amount Of property passing, and if that plan were adopted he believed it would produce as large an amount for the Exchequer as the present plan, while the tax would be levied more justly. He had on two occasions respectfully protested against the general ad captandum argument of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that the separation of the two classes of property would materially reduce the amount to be received by the Exchequer. As to that they had had no satisfactory information from the right hon. Gentleman. No doubt he regarded it as his business to pay not the slightest attention to their protests. He not only paid no attention, but he also rendered it absolutely impossible for them to extract any information. If the determination was that the rich should be made to pay, and that those who were only moderately endowed should be let off, surely there was a readier and simpler means of imposing the duty on the richer recipient; than one involving the gross injustice of; charging the poorer and smaller legatees the full rate simply because what they received happened to form part of a large estate. He would not again enter into details, but he would point out another objection to the scheme of which the House should take note. They were going, for the mere purpose of swelling the amount of the tax, to include property which iii no strictly legal or equitable sense ought to be included. It was monstrous to suggest that the mere accident of a particular individual having temporarily enjoyed the benefits of a property as to which he had no powers of disposition should justify the treatment of that property in the same way as ordinary property. It amounted to charging people a tax on benefits which they did not participate in or receive. Then there was another difficulty which would create a great amount of heartburning, for the Government by proposing to tax an estate on the principal capital value were accentuating and increasing the burdens to be borne by those on whom the Estate Duty would fall, because it was imposed irrespective of the benefit that accrued. Finally, when they applied this system of graduation to a tax not levied rateably or in proportion to the amount received, they were increasing the amount in the £1 which would ultimately fall on the smaller recipients. He was aware he could not expect the Solicitor General to agree with him. No doubt right hon. Gentlemen opposite looked upon him as a most misguided man, and a most ignorant individual, but lie did suggest that when matters such as these were brought to the attention of the House they had a right to expect that some attempt should be made to meet them in alleviating objections and removing difficulties. But nothing of the sort was done. He sincerely trusted be might find he was mistaken in his views, but ho could not allow the clause to pass without stating in the most emphatic way that, however much money might be gained by it, the tax would be levied on unjust principles and not in proportion to the ability of the receiver, but according to the accident of the amount of the estate, and the result would be to add enormously to the expense and increase seriously the burdens of those who had to deal with estates.

*MR. BARTLEY

said, he did not object to the principle of aggregation provided it was fairly and properly applied, but his contention was that it should not be on the corpus of the estate, but on the benefit received by individual inheritors. He could conceive nothing more unjust than to make a man pay, not in proportion to what he received, but in proportion to what somebody happened to die worth. That being the principle of the clause, although it would no doubt bring more money into the Exchequer, it had something wrong at the bottom of it, and he, for one, could not support it. The Debates they had had upon Clauses 2 and 3 showed the enormous complications which the system of aggregation would involve, an infinite number of difficult problems had been brought to light, and the difficulty which already existed in inducing persons to act as trustees would be so intensified that he could not conceive anyone voluntarily taking upon himself the responsibilities, troubles, and worries which would attend the settling up of even small estates. Indeed, none but professional men would care to undertake the duty. That was a serious consideration in connection with this part of the Budget. He should therefore oppose the clause, but he wished it to be clearly understood that he approved the system of aggregation when the tax was levied not on the corpus of the estate, but on the amount of benefit to the individual receiver.

MR. GRANT LAWSON

asked hon. Members to judge between the Government proposal and the alternative one put forward by the Opposition. The Government wanted to tax the property of the deceased; the Opposition preferred to tax the property passing into the hands of the living. If Dives left Lazarus £100, Lazarus, because Dives was a rich man, would have to pay a high duty; but if Lazarus left Dives £100, Dives, with all his riches, would only I pay a low rate. That was the simple proposition of the Government against which they were fighting. He would take another instance showing the injustice of the proposal. A man died and left £5,000 divisible among five children. If it so happened that his eldest son by another disposition got £100,000, the younger children would have to pay 6 per cent, on their smaller legacies of £1,000 each, instead of 2 per cent.,; which was the proper rate upon the amount they would receive. Could any hon. Member stand up in his place and: defend such a system? The Chancellor of the Exchequer wanted to get at the great estates; his complaint against them was that they passed in great blocks, but under his scheme the only sufferers would be the estates that would be broken up; it was on them that the great burden would fall. The object of the Government policy was to split up property, but this was a clause for the protection of millionaires at the expense of the less favourably situated classes. The clause as it stood would create a grievous injustice, and he thought the electors of the country would readily understand the necessity they were under of opposing it. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had seen a ghost—the ghost of a millionaire —and he imagined it was escaping to a place where there were no Chancellors of the Exchequer, taking with it some property which was taxable. The right hon. Gentleman was pursuing the phantom, hoping that he would catch it and tax it. As the Opposition were of opinion that the only fair principle of taxation was one based upon the taxation of living men, they would vote against the clause.

*MR. T. H. BOLTON

said, he hardly liked to give a silent vote on this clause, because it contained certain propositions which it was difficult to contest, although the application of them was equally difficult to defend. The proposition that a fair charge should be put upon the capital value was one which was applied to a very large extent to personalty, and one the application of which to real estate it was very difficult to resist. Then, again, it would probably not be contested that properties of a similar kind going to the same family ought to be aggregated, but the association of estates which were not similar in their character, and which went to different classes of people, could not, he thought, very well be justified. As regarded graduation, if it implied putting increased taxation on the shoulders of those who were best able to bear it, everybody would approve of it, but he did not very well understand why an increased duty should be put upon a number of small benefits because in the aggregate they amounted to a large benefit. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had said that all the family property should be put together for the purpose of taxation on the principle upon which Probate Duty was levied. This clause, however, did not carry out that proposition in its integrity, because it associated with the family property property which came from an entirely different source, and might be enjoyed only to a very limited extent by the family. It seemed to him to be absolutely wrong in principle that the duty should be increased in the case of a man who took a portion of a large estate, as compared with a man who took a precisely similar portion of a small estate. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had defended the new Estate Duty upon the ground that the State had a prior claim, but a much better ground had been suggested in the speech of his right hon. Friend the Member for Bodmin (Mr. Courtney)—namely, that the duty was a sort of deferred Income Tax and was money owing by the deceased to the State. It would not, however, be taken out of the property of the deceased, who had enjoyed the benefit of the income all his life, but out of the property of persons who succeeded him and who might be entirely independent of him. The result of the adoption of the proposals of the Government must weigh very heavily upon a class of property in this country which was at present in a very depressed condition. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had spoken with sympathy of the depression of the landed interest, and had appeared to throw out the suggestion that something would be done to alleviate the burden of the tax as far as agricultural land was concerned. The right hon. Gentleman had almost shed tears over the depressed condition of agriculture. The right hon. Gentleman had reminded him of the carpenter in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, who shed tears over the oysters, but nevertheless ate them all the same. The right hon. Gentleman, whilst he expressed the greatest amount of sympathy with the agricultural interest, imposed taxation which would press very heavily upon it. The effect of the present proposal of the Government must be to diminish expenditure upon estates, and the result would be that not only the squire would suffer, but that suffering would be inflicted upon a large class of persons dependent upon him: the tradesmen in the villages, the farmers, and the labourers, in whom those who were called the friends of the agricultural labourer professed to take such great interest. He believed it would be very difficult to carry out the system of aggregation and graduation proposed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and that if the Bill passed in its present form it would require very considerable amendment at no very distant date. He viewed with considerable apprehension the policy embodied in this clause, and he believed that its results would not justify the sanguine anticipations of the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

MR. BOUSFIELD (Hackney, N.)

said, it might seem invidious to draw attention to one fault in the clause, but it was only in regard to one that ho desired to draw attention. He hoped that before the Report stage the Government would go a little further in the direction of the proviso. There surely was reasonable ground for asking that the Government should make some concession in regard to incomes which were only enjoyed during life. A life interest in £10,000 of Consols—yielding an income of £300 a year—ought not to be aggregated in the same way as property amounting to £10,000, which had been wholly possessed by the deceased person. If the Government would give way on this point the concession would tend to remove many of the objections to the clause.

MR. BYRNE

said, he wished to protest against the principle on which the clause was founded, which could only be described as "aggregation gone mad." The clause would create groat delay in winding-up estates, and that, apart from anything else, would cause grave inconvenience. He thought he should have the sanction of the Chancellor of the Exchequer for saying that, whatever taxation was to be imposed on capital values, it was, above all things, desirable to ascertain at as early a date as possible the amount of duties that wore payable. Hitherto there had been no difficulty in bringing voluntary gifts and settlements into the same category. They were paid once and for all, and there was no difficulty in dealing with the property. So it had been with reference to charges for beneficial interests. But under the present scheme of aggregation the Chancellor of the Exchequer had made a charge the amount of which would be unascertainable, sometimes for years, and which was not regulated like the Probate Duty by the amount of the property which passed irrespective of the beneficiaries. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had, on the contrary, established a purely artificial standard. He would appeal to the right hon. Gentleman, in the interest of the freedom of alienation, whether he could not choose some method of charging an ad valorem duty on settlements made during life. Then they could calculate and know for a certainty what they were dealing with. At present, however, the right hon. Gentleman was imposing the gravest impediments on the free alienation of property, was creating great delay in the winding-up of estates in the future, and was preventing people from knowing definitely and soon the utmost amount they would have to pay according to the benefits they were going to take.

Question put.

The Committee divided: —Ayes 101; Noes 58.—(Division List, No. 82.)

Clause 4.

MR. W. AMBROSE (Middlesex, Harrow)

moved to omit the first lines of Section 1 of the clause to the end of Sub-Section (a). He pointed out that the introductory words of the clause would create a difficulty, and that if they were retained the following words would be of no use. If it were not considered necessary to strike out the first words, he would be quite prepared to limit his Amendment to the sub-section. At present, however, he moved the omission of all the lines.

THE CHAIRMAN (Mr. A. O'CONNOR)

ruled that this could not be done, as the Amendment would exclude the Amendment of the hon. Member for York.

MR. AMBROSE

explained that he had proposed to move the omission of all the lines in order to show the sense of the Amendment, his object being to take the opinion of the Committee upon the section. However, he was quite willing to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

*MR. BUTCHER (York)

moved to leave out "remains settled" and insert "passes," urging that the clause as it stood would inflict hardship. The object of the Amendment was to ensure that not more than one Estate Duty should be paid, as according to the statement of the Attorney General in reply to the right hon. Member for Bodmin, that was the distinct intention of the Government. Until settlements were worked out there should not be a double Estate Duty exacted. That intention of the Government was not quite clear as the Bill stood. He would illustrate what he meant by putting the ease of a property settled upon two tenants for life, and then passing absolutely to a man and his children. A second Estate Duty was not payable under the scheme of the Bill until the whole settlement was worked out. According to the words of the Bill it would be necessary in order to prevent a second Estate Duty becoming payable for the property to remain settled after the second death, which, strictly speaking, I was not the case, because it passed absolutely. The intention of the Government was not carried out by the clause as it stood. The words he suggested would I carry out that intention, and were not liable to the Chancellor of the Exchequer's sinister charge of evasion.

Amendment proposed, in page 3, line 2, to leave out the words "remains settled," and insert the word "passes." —(Mr. Butcher.)

Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause."

MR. R. T. REID

said, that he could not accept the Amendment, as the words of the clause had been very carefully considered. The words were perfectly applicable, and the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member would not improve the clause. He could not accept the interpretation which had been put upon it.

MR. BYRNE

asked the Solicitor General whether he considered that property settled on one person for life with remainder to another absolutely remained settled or not upon the death of the tenant for life? That was the simple question. Surely it could not be any longer considered settled property.

SIR W. HARCOURT

said, that the language of the clause was framed according to the ordinary legal phraseology.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR (Manchester, E.)

said that, after all, the Committee had to consider what was the meaning of the words. To an ordinary understanding a settlement was determined when the property reached the hands of the final owner. If this were ordinary legal language, then legal language was very ill-contrived to express ordinary ideas. A settlement was merely a channel by which property was visibly directed to an end, and surely it became worked out when the property had passed from the person who settled it through the various beneficiaries to the persons to whom it finally passed. It came to them through the pipe or channel of the settlement, and when it reached them it was in the open sea. It belonged to them absolutely in fee simple. To express it otherwise was an abuse of language, and, however consistent it might be with legal, was certainly inconsistent with non-legal English. He did not know how the Committee would interpret this clause, but the view taken by his learned Friends, as great authorities in these matters as any in the House, coincided with that which every layman would take of the ordinary meaning of the English language. It might as well be said that the water of a river on arriving at the open sea remained still the water of the river as to say that property which came to a person through a settlement was still in settlement, and probably the Government would see the necessity of reconsidering their language.

MR. GIBSON BOWLES

said, this clause would place an additional burden upon property. The moment the suspension of property under a settlement came to an end the property no longer remained in settlement. A new tax should be laid upon definite property at a definite point of time. In this case the point of time chosen was the death of the owner. That was the only point to be regarded by this Bill, and the Government could not go either behind or beyond it. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had told the Committee that the object was to tax the property of the dead man, and if they passed from that point of time in any way, they must go back to the ghost—to the time when the ghost still possessed his property, and before it had become sub-divided upon his death. It was upon his ghost that the duty was levied. "After his death" the Exchequer had nothing to do with it, and therefore the clause named the wrong point of time. "Remains settled" was an ambiguous phrase, because the property passed, and the settlement did not remain.

*THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Mr. H. H. FOWLER, Wolverhampton, E.)

said, that they all wished to arrive at the same result. The supporters of the Amendment had omitted one possible case. If property were settled upon A for his life, then upon A's wife for her life, and then upon children, it remained settled upon the death of A. There was no doubt about that.

*MR. BUTCHER

admitted that the words of the clause were appropriate to that case; but if there were a remainder to children, the settlement came to an end with the death of the wife, and the property no longer remained settled. In such a case the property "passes by virtue of a disposition then already made," as he proposed the clause should read.

MR. HALDANE (Haddington)

pointed out that the Definition Clause solved the difficulty, as it provided tliat— The expression 'settled property' means property comprised in a settlement. It was very important to hear that in mind in reference to these words with regard to property settled by the deceased person being liable to Estate Duty. Although the property became held in fee simple, the fee simple arose by virtue of the settlement. The words had been chosen very carefully.

SIR MARK STEWART (Kirkcudbright)

said, settled estate passed partly on the death of the son and partly on the death of the wife, when it passed in fee simple and was no longer estate to be taxed.

MR. BYRNE

said, the reply given by his hon. and learned Friend was absolutely no answer to the question he had put, whether property settled upon a person for life with remainder to someone else became absolutely the property of the tenant for life. The Definition Clause did not apply to a case where the settlement came to an end with remainder to someone else, whose property it be- came absolutely. Really the matter appeared too clear for argument. He challenged any lawyer in the House to say that when property was settled upon a man for life with remainder to his wife with remainder over to someone else, and when the second of the two lives fell in, the property did not then cease to be settled property.

SIR W. HARCOURT

was understood to say he did not dispute that at all. As far as he could see, it now appeared that the effect of the Amendment would be to extend the, operation of the clause and to include within its scope all settled property, and even property that had actually passed out of settlement. As in certain cases he would obtain an additional duty if the Amendment were carried he was not indisposed to assent to it.

MR. GERALD BALFOUR (Leeds, Central)

said, that a minute ago the Government were striving anxiously to retain the words, but now they were not only willing to give up the words but were going to accept the Amendment. This change of front was perplexing. If it were true that the difficulties which had been pointed out by his hon. Friends were involved in the words as they now stood, and then if other difficulties were involved in the words proposed, it was perfectly clear the Government ought to revise the drafting of the clause.

MR. GIBSON BOWLES

observed that on settled property the Government intended to attach this additional 1s. per cent., but by their own avowal there was no 1s. per cent, duty payable. What, therefore, was the good of the clause?

*MR. BUTCHER

said, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer had kindly accepted his Amendment, ho should be the last in the world to destroy the right hon. Gentleman's intention. As they now knew what the intentions of the Government were, he should be prepared to move his Amendment in the form in which it stood, and to produce at some later stage, when convenient, words in order to carry out the intention of the Government—namely, there being only one life interest in 'the settlement, and the property going to the children, the Chancellor of the Exchequer told them he did not desire further Estate Duty to be paid. Ho should certainly suggest some words in the Bill to carry out that intention of the Government, and meanwhile he should press this Amendment.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

did not think they ought to accept any alteration of the Bill unless the Government could give reasons for the alteration. He would ask the Committee to consider for a moment the position in which they were. An Amendment had been moved by his hon. and learned Friend, who argued that the words of the Bill did not carry out the intentions of the Government. The first answer of the Government to that was that the hon. and learned Gentleman had rightly interpreted the intentions of the Government, and that the words of the Bill would carry out their intentions. Upon that a Debate arose and lasted for some time, and then up got the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who had the courage—which he never lacked—to throw over his hon. and learned Friend beside him, and to say that the intentions of the Government were not the intentions that they understood. [Sir W. HARCOURT dissented.] Did the words carry out the intentions of the Government? He should like to understand whether they did or not.

SIR W. HARCOURT

said, that gentlemen opposite were very hard to please. He was ready to adopt their words or to adhere to his own. He could do no more. He was quite willing to carry out the intentions of the Government as expressed in the Bill, but if the Opposition were good enough to give the Government more than they asked for, ho, of course, should be glad. The Amendment moved by the hon. and learned Member opposite would effect a good deal more than the Government had intended. To that he did not object, and he hoped that no more time would be wasted upon the matter.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

said, that the right hon. Gentleman was in a charming humour. The interpretation now put upon his hon. and learned Friend's Amendment was that it would impose additional taxation. In that case it was out of Order. It would require a separate Resolution, and they could not consider it until that Resolution had been passed, and he therefore asked whether the Amendment was in Order.

THE CHAIRMAN (Mr. A. O'CONNOR)

I cannot say that it is out of Order.

Question put, and agreed to.

*MR. BARTLEY moved, in page 3, line 3, at end, add— Any person accountable for the duty may decide whether he will pay the Estate Duty only or the Estate Duty and a further Estate Duty. In the event of his paying the Estate Duty only the payment under this part of the Act shall be the same as if the property were not settled. The object of the Amendment, he explained, was to give the person accountable for the duty the option of paying the further Estate Duty and getting the advantages accruing from paying that extra Estate Duty, or of paying the ordinary duty and not getting the advantages of the settlement as regarded the duty. It seemed to him that there could be no possible objection on the part of the Government to adopt this proposal. The reason for the Amendment was obvious. There were many cases in which the person accountable for the duty would not care to receive the advantages which this clause gave to settled property. The Amendment would allow settled property to be treated as unsettled property at the option of the person accountable. The Revenue would not suffer by the proposal, and therefore he did not see why the Chancellor of the Exchequer should object to it. In Clause 1 the Government had prided themselves on assimilating real and personal property. If real property was to be treated the same as personal, and those interested in settled estates wished to pay the same taxation as was paid in the case of unsettled estates, it seemed to him only fair and reasonable they should allow them that option, which would be extremely fair, and he could not think that the Exchequer would suffer by it. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had distinctly stated that settled estates paid less than others, but if every estate took advantage of this proposal, and did not accept the advantages of paying the duty given in the case of settlements, then the result would be that all settled would pay exactly the same as unsettled property. His motive in drafting the Amendment had been to provide that settled estates, if they preferred it, should not take advantage of those privileges given by settlement, but should pay as if they were unsettled, and in that case would be treated as unsettled estates. He begged to propose the Amendment.

Amendment proposed, in page 3, line 3, at end, to add— Any person accountable for the duty may decide whether he will pay the Estate Duty only or the Estate Duty and a further Estate Duty. In the event of his paying the Estate Duty only the payment under this part of the Act shall be the same as if the property were not settled."—(Bartley.)

Question proposed, "That those words be there added."

SIR W. HARCOURT

said, the principle on which the Government had proceeded with regard to settlements was that they only charged once upon a settlement, however many lives were covered by the settlement. They charged an average sum of 1s. per cent., which, as he had previously stated, was a sort of experimental compensation covering the whole lives in the settlement by a single payment. Whether that was enough he rather doubted, but at all events they did not think they were putting it too high at first. Now what the hon. Member proposed was that the executor or the first man should have the option of saying whether he would take the advantage of treating it as unsettled and paying duty upon a life, or whether he would take advantage of the arrangement provided by the Bill, and pay 1 per cent, to cover all the lives. It was quite obvious that if he was a wise man he would take the option which was most disadvantageous to the revenue. The 1 per cent, duty on settlements was based upon an average of what they believed to be the duration of settlements, but if the good lives were taken out and only the bad ones left, that would defeat the arrangement altogether. It was not a good thing to leave the matter optional. They ought to have a fixed rule laid down by which an executor should be bound, and he should not be allowed to enter into what, after all, would be more or less of a gambling transaction. Under these circumstances, he hoped that the hon. Member would not press the Amendment.

MR. GRAHAM-MURRAY (Buteshire)

said, that if the only thing that could be said against this Amendment was what was said by the Chancellor of the Exchequer he was not sure he should not have felt it his duty to support the Amendment, because he could not quite acquiesce in the notion that there was a sort of heaven-born right in Chancellors of the Exchequer to make it always wrong for a subject to choose out that line of conduct which might seem to give him the best chance of paying the least taxes. He always understood it was the right of a subject to arrange his affairs so as to let his taxes be as little difficult as it was possible for them to be. If ho thought that all the persons interested had a fair choice he should have gone very much with what had fallen from the hon. Member for Islington. But he did not think that was what would really happen here. He was afraid if the Amendment were carried a great injustice might be done to many deserving people by those who would rather scheme to save their own pockets and who would not think of those who came after them. The scheme of compounding the rate on settlement at 1 per cent. was a scheme many of them on that side of the House viewed with very great favour. They thought there ought not to be any obstacle placed in the way of allowing people to provide the best way they could for their families; therefore it was quite right that when property was to be handed from one member to another of a family there should be a rate charged upon each succession. But the Committee would see that if the Amendment were carried the result would be this: that it might give an unfair opportunity to the first man who came into the property to do an injustice to those who came after him by not paying the extra 1 per cent. duty. Such a course would naturally be followed by a man who cared only about his own pocket and had no interest in those that came after him, who would by his action be liable to pay the whole of the ruinous Estate Duties. For these reasons he could not support the Amendment.

MR. GIBSON BOWLES

said, ho felt it was his duty to continue to give that support to the Government which he had always extended to them in regard to this Bill. His objection to this Amendment was that it sinned against all the verities of tax collection. It went against a fundamental principle of taxation by placing in the hands of the executor the power of affixing a character to property that might never have been intended should be placed upon it by Act of Parliament. If the Amendment passed the executor could elect to treat the property as either "settled or unsettled," and could pay the duty upon the one class or the other as he thought fit. That was an option that should never be left to an executor, and he could not help thinking that his hon. Friend had scarcely sufficiently studied the principles of tax-collecting before he framed his Amendment, and he hoped, therefore, that he would withdraw it.

MR. BARTLEY

remarked, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer objected to his Amendment on the ground that the Government would lose by it, and his hon. Friend objected to it because the Government would get too great an advantage under it. He was therefore in a dilemma as to what was the best thing to do, and he thought that the wisest course would be for him to withdraw it.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

MR. W. AMBROSE

moved to leave out Sub-section (a), or so much of it as provides that a further Estate Duty on the principal value of the property shall be levied at the rate hereinafter specified. The clause provided that where property liable to Estate Duty was settled by the will of the deceased, this further estate duty mentioned in Sub-section (a) should be payable. But he would call the attention of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to the fact that in 19 cases out of 20 every disposition made by a testator was more or loss of a settlement within the meaning of this clause. He did not know how a will could be made in the case of a man having a family to provide for in which every disposition he could make would not amount to a settlement. The effect of this would be that whereas the Chancellor of the Exchequer levied duty only at a given rate in the scale, in truth there would be afterwards an additional 1s. per cent, put upon it, and that seemed to him oppressive in the extreme. He did not think that the Chancellor of the Exchequer, though he had got to raise the value, need resort to acts of oppression, and he hoped, therefore, the right hon. Gentleman would accept this Amendment, the duty levied by the precedent clauses being amply sufficient without pressing people in this position for this further duty. He begged to move the Amendment.

Amendment proposed, in page 3, line 4, to leave out paragraph (a).—(Mr. W. Ambrose).

Question proposed, "That the words '(a) a further Estate Duty on the principal value of the' stand part of the Clause."

MR. R. T. REID

opposed the Amendment on the ground that it was directly opposed to the policy of the Government, as announced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in regard to settled estates.

MR. GRAHAM MURRAY

supported the Amendment, which, he said, if accepted would mitigate the unnecessary harshness with which the Bill would operate on many families where there happened to be frequent successions by death at short intervals. As the Bill now stood, properties would, to a great extent, be affected by life. One property would not get hit because there was a long life, and another would get much hit because there was a succession of lives, one after the other. If, however, the Amendment were accepted, the life element would be excluded from property settled in families; and such property would be, to a great extent, saved from the harsh and uncertain treatment he had indicated.

Question put.

The Committee divided: —Ayes 114; Noes 76.—(Division List, No. 83.)

On Motion of Mr. GIBSON BOWLES, the following Amendments were agreed to: —Rage 3, line 4, after the second "the," insert "settled." Page 3, line 6, after "such," insert "settled."

*MR. BUTCHER moved to omit from Sub-section (b) page 3, line 9, the word "was," in order to insert "had," and also to leave out in line 10, the words— or had been at any time competent to dispose of, in order to insert— the right by the exercise of any power, or otherwise, to vest in himself the absolute interest in. The necessity for the Amendments arose from the inconvenient refusal of the Government to define, in the early clauses of the Bill, the words "competent to dispose of." The intentions of the Government were that a second Estate Duty should not be paid under existing settlements when once Estate Duty had been paid in respect to the particular estate. But there was one exception to the rule, and that was where the deceased at the time of his death was competent to dispose of the property. The words of the Government were unfortunate. Under the proposed definition, which was to be found in Clause 18, a person was "competent to dispose of" such property when he had only a tenancy in tail in remainder, which might never vest at all. Suppose a man had only an expectancy in an estate, and died, the estate never having vested in him, one would have expected that the second Estate Duty would not be payable; but, according to the peculiar wording of Clause 18, a second duty would, in his view, become payable. Unless this Amendment was carried double Estate Duty would have to be paid in cases in which, he thought, the Government did not intend it to be paid.

Amendment proposed, in page 3, line 9, to leave out the word "was," and insert the word "had."—(Mr. Butcher.)

Question proposed, "That the word 'was' stand part of the Clause."

MR. R. T. REID

said, he thought that the difference between the hon. and learned Gentleman and the Government was almost microscopic. The hon. and learned Member objected to a man being considered competent to dispose of property if he was tenant in tail in remainder. The tenant in tail in remainder was in a position if he got the consent of the protector of the settlement to bar the estate tail, but without that consent he could create a base fee, and under Clause 18 the expression "competent to dispose" would include a person who could create a base fee. It was an extremely technical point that the hon. and learned Member raised—one that would require an explanation of a couple of hours from some skilled exponent of real property law. If they were to discuss questions of that kind upon Amendments they would take a very long time to get through with the Bill. He was afraid he could not accept the Amendment. He preferred the drafting of the Government draftsman and the opinion of the Attorney General to that of the hon. and learned Gentleman.

MR. A. J. BALFOUR

said, the Solicitor General rested his case on the competence of the gentlemen who advised the Government. He admitted that those gentlemen were extremely able— in fact, geniuses, if the Solicitor General liked; but he had never yet heard of a Government who, when asked in Committee of the whole House to show that their Bill even carried out their own intentions, fell back upon the skill and ability of those who drafted the Bill. The hon. and learned Gentleman had come into the discussion of this Bill under great difficulties, and he had won the admiration and approval of the Committee for the way in which he was discharging the difficult and delicate task which had suddenly been put upon him. They had been deprived of the assistance of the Attorney General, who was especially qualified to guide them in these matters of conveyancing, but they must be allowed to argue a question of drafting when it arose. He thought his hon. and learned Friend the Mover of the Amendment was perfectly right to abide by his opinion unless the Government consented to argue the question and show him that he was wrong. His hon. and learned Friend was a most competent authority on this subject; and though he did not say that his hon. and learned Friend was in this matter exactly right, his opinion was at least worth consideration; and if the Solicitor General refused to consider it his hon. and learned Friend would do well to divide the Committee on the question.

MR. GIBSON BOWLES

said, he could not allow the Solicitor General to be the victim of his own modesty. No doubt the Attorney General was a great man, but if the Attorney General were there instead of the Solicitor General, the Bill would not have arrived as far as its present stage in so short a time. He should deprecate the modesty of the Solicitor General in refusing to discuss the question because it had already been decided by the Attorney General. He would point out that the Attorney General was not present to listen to his argument, and it was therefore impossible to say what opinion the Attorney General would have arrived at at the end of that argument. There was a great deal more than the question of drafting in the Amendment. The peculiarity of the Bill was that it was impossible to understand a point without referring to another clause, and in some cases to two of these other clauses. In Clause 18 they found— A person shall be deemed competent to dispose of property if he has such an estate or interest therein or such general power as would, if he were sui juris, enable him to dispose of the property," &c. What was the result of that? Why, that those gentlemen who in Clause 4 were treated as though they were competent to dispose were gentlemen who were not sui juris, or, in other words, persons not competent to dispose. They were not their own master, or capable of exercising that power which constituted competency to dispose. Why, an infant five mouths old—to put an extreme case, a lunatic infant of five months old—would be included, and it would scarcely be contended that such a person was "competent to dispose."

Question put.

The Committee divided: —Ayes 105; Noes 71.— (Div. List, No. 84.)

Committee report Progress; to sit again upon Monday next.