HC Deb 21 July 1896 vol 43 cc310-8

(1.) Where a superior landlord recovers against an immediate landlord a judgment in ejectment for nonpayment of the rent of a holding, or of lands including a holding, the estate of the immediate landlord shall be deemed to be determined within the meaning of section fifteen of the Land Law (Ireland) Act, 1881, without prejudice to his right to redeem his interest.

(2.) Where the nonpayment was not due to the nonpayment of rent by the tenant of the holding, such judgment shall not be executed against the tenant, and the tenancy of the holding shall not be affected, except that the superior landlord shall stand in the relation of immediate landlord to the tenant, and may proceed accordingly for the recovery of all rent due from the tenant to the immediate landlord, but (except in the case of fraud or collusion or a letting at a gross under value) not for the recovery of the rent due to the superior from the immediate landlord. If the amount recovered by the superior landlord from the tenant equals or exceeds the amount due to him from the immediate landlord, the interest of the immediate landlord shall not be deemed to have been redeemed, but the superior landlord shall pay the excess to the immediate landlord, after deducting any amount due for costs.

* THE CHAIRMAN

The first Amendment standing in the name of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Dublin University—to omit Subsection (1)—I do not think is properly in order, because if the 1st Sub-section of this clause were to be omitted, the 2nd Sub-section as it stands would not read. His objection is to the clause as a whole, and the proper way to raise it is when the Question is put, "That the clause stand part of the Bill."

MR. CARSON moved at the end of Sub-section (1) after the word "interest," to insert the words:— as if a decree or a writ of habeas facias possessionem had been executed.

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND

intimated that the Government would accept the Amendment.

Amendment agreed to.

MR. CARSON moved in Sub-section (2) to omit the words "where the nonpayment was not due to the non-payment of rent by the tenant of the holding," and to insert instead thereof the words:— The payment by the tenant of the holding of the amount due to the landlord under such judgment shall not operate to redeem the interest of the immediate landlord, and upon such payment, but subject to such right of rederption as aforesaid.

This Amendment, he remarked, practically brought the whole question of Clause 9 under discussion, and, so far as he was concerned, it was not only the only Amendment which he should move as regarded Clause 9, with a view to explaining what the clause meant, but—except as regarded the postponed Clause 4—it would be the only Amendment he should have to move which in any way seriously affected the Bill. The present Amendment raised the question whether in the case of ejectment for non-payment of rent in Ireland where there were subtenants, the process of ejectment for non-payment of rent was to be abolished; because that was practically what the sub-section came to. He remembered last year, when this very clause was proposed in the Bill of the right hon. Member for Montrose, he (Mr. Carson) was put up to reply for the Chief Secretary, when he stated that he considered the clause one of the revolutionary clauses of the Bill. He noticed that the Chief Secretary, in copying this clause from the Bill of the late Chief Secretary, said that this was a matter upon which both sides were entirely agreed. He did not know why the Chief Secretary had given the go-by to what was stated by him (Mr. Carson) a year ago on behalf of the Government, except, perhaps, that one's ideas of property probably altered according as one found one's self on one side of the House or the other. He thought the provisions of this clause were vastly more important as regarded the whole relation of landlord and tenant, than those of any other clause in the Bill. The question of improvements was insignificant as compared with the question of the administration of the Act. He thought he was not going too far when he stated that the one method which the landlord had under the law of enforcing a contract with a tenant was ejectment for non-payment of rent. He did not suppose that in 99 cases out of 100 the landlords intended to obtain personal judgment, which was always futile, because they would find, if they came to realise, that the stock had been removed and that it was impossible for the Sheriff to levy any execution. The one remedy, therefore, which the landlord had had during many years of disturbance in Ireland, was this remedy of ejectment for non-payment of rent, and if that was to be taken away and infringed upon, he could not see that it would be possible for the landlord in future, in the cases to which this section applied, in the event of any unpleasantness arising with his tenant, to insist upon the carrying out of the obligations of the contract between landlord and tenant at all. The section proposed that where there were sub-tenants the landlord, if he got a decree in ejectment proceedings, should not be able to execute his judgment so as to get possession of the land as against the sub-tenants. Now what would it come to? It came to this. Supposing a tenant who had been a sub-tenant said "I won't pay" the landlord must wait for a year before he could bring his action for ejectment for non-payment, but this section said "having got your judgment you cannot exercise it." In other words the landlord might get rid of the middleman but he could not get his land: he could get neither his land nor his money. Was that what the Goverment meant by this section? He at once conceded that there were matters to which the tenant had a right. Where there was a middleman he thought that it was a hard case that the sub-tenant, who was willing to hold on in the event of the middleman being displaced, should not be able to do so without again setting up the interest of the middleman. He urged that the immediate relations should be with the landlord and not with the middleman, and in the event of the latter being dispossessed the sub-tenants should become the tenants of the superior landlord. But that was not what the section proposed. The section said in plain terms that the superior landlord, even if there was a year's rent due, was not to have either his rent or his land as an alternative. He knew there were provisions made and that the superior landlord might proceed to recover any arrears of rent due by the sub-tenant to the middleman, but it would be throwing good money after bad if the landlord were to proceed to search out from the sub-tenants what was the amount of rent they owed to the middleman and then proceed against either of them. Was that the position in which the Irish landlord should be left? How could they confront such a combination as the Plan of Campaign if this section were enforced. What he had said in Opposition he repeated now, that this was a revolutionary proposal and destructive of the interest of the landlord. He was not going into various other matters, but the sole object of his Amendment was to prevent what would be a glaring injustice. This Amendment raised the whole question of ejectment for non-payment of rent, and he thought the Government ought to hesitate before they passed the section as it stood.

MR. GERALD BALFOUR

said he did not profess to understand the exact effect of the Amendment, but he was bound to say that he had thought that the clause was non-contentious. ["Hear, hear!"] Surely these sub-tenants were in no way to blame for the default of the middleman. Were they to proceed against these sub-tenants for a debt due to the landlord, not by them, but by some one else? He thought that the Committee would agreed with him that the Government, in the Bill, had adopted nothing abnormal or extraordinary in regard to this clause. ["Hear, hear!"]

COLONEL SAUNDERSON

put this case before the Committee. He had a farm, and he let it to a tenant under the condition that he paid his rent. This tenant, without his knowledge, sub-let the land to other tenants. The landlord of course, had his remedy of ejecting his tenant for running against the law as to sub-letting. But what what would happen if he took that course? The whole Radical Party would be in arms. They would send deputations to Ireland, and right hon. Gentlemen would come down to that House and weep tears over the awful sight of evictions taking place in Ireland owing to the merciless action of the landlords turning out these inoffensive persons. Therefore, in numberless cases landlords in Ireland had not proceeded to the extreme course of eviction. But now what was to happen to him as the landlord? First of all he would be fined one year's rent, why he did not know, but that was the clause so far as he understood it. Then he should find himself confronted by a number of sub-tenants. He could not get rent from the middleman because he had levanted under this clause, if it passed into law; the new tenants who came upon the landlord without his leave, had paid him no rent, and he could not recover from them. They asked for a fair rent to be fixed. He had got to wait until that process had taken place, and then, when the fair rent was fixed, if they refused to pay him, what was he to do? He would probably have a couple of years to wait, and probably have to engage in a number of lawsuits. If the middleman disappeared, and if the sub-tenants were to become tenants of his, under a fair rent, it would be only in conformity with the most elementary principles of justice that his rent should be paid. He could not conceive why the Government should object to put in their Bill, if these new tenants were to remain on the land and were to come in at a fair rent, the proposal of his right hon. Friend. He hoped the Government would consider the matter again, and not put them in the difficulty of asking the House to divide.

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND

said the Government were unable to accept the Amendment of his right hon. Friend, for the reason that it would defeat altogether the policy which was embodied first in the 15th section of the Act of 1881. [Irish Nationalist cheers.] His hon. and gallant Friend objected to two things in this clause. First, he objected to tenants being thrust upon him; and next, he objected to that being done at what might be a pecuniary loss to himself. As to the first point, he would remind his hon. and gallant Friend that this clause was analogous to Clause 15 of the Act of 1881, which provided that, no matter whether a middleman had broken his lease or not, no matter whether he had discharged any of the duties of his tenancy or not, and no matter whether he had paid any rent or not, if his title expired either by fluxion of time or by notice to quit, the sub-tenants were thrust upon the landlord, who was not to be heard to say that he had suffered any pecuniary loss from the conduct of the middleman. His hon. and gallant Friend said that the sub-tenants might inflict pecuniary loss upon him. Possibly that might be so—[cheers from below the Ministerial Gangway]—just as he would whenever he allowed a tenant to run into arrear and and he had to evict him. But he would have a much greater chance of getting his rent from the sub-tenant than he would have if there was no one in possession at all but the middleman. He would have the sub-tenant to look to, who would be obliged to pay him anything he owed to the middleman. He dared say it was possible that under the operation of this clause some pecuniary loss might be inflicted upon his hon. and gallant Friend. But he would put a case of even greater hardship and greater injustice. That was a case where the sub-tenants had paid up to the middleman every shilling they owed, and yet, because the middleman had fallen into arrear, under the law, as it stood at present, the head landlord could bring an ejectment, determine all their tenancies, and turn both them and the middleman out. That was a great injustice and hardship, and they wished to guard against it. [Nationalist cheers.] This clause gave the landlord the right to sue for any money that was due from the sub-tenants to the middleman and recover it.

MR. CARSON

How is the head landlord to find it out?

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND

said he should have no difficulty in finding that out. While the middleman was running into arrear the head landlord could, if he liked, serve notice on the sub-tenants to pay their rent. Nothing was easier in the world than to do that before he took his ejectment, and to ascertain whether, in point of fact, they had paid rent to the middleman or not. He did not say that would enable him to bring ejectment against the sub-tenants. He thought it would be very wrong if it did; but it provided, as far as possible, against pecuniary loss falling upon the landlord. [Nationalist cheers.]

* SIR JOHN COLOMB (Great Yarmouth)

would like to submit a concrete case to the Attorney General for Ireland. Suppose there was a middleman and a number of sub-tenants. The sub-tenants, say, had paid up to the 1st of November. On the 1st of May the middleman was ejected. The superior landlord then came in as the immediate landlord of those tenants. They owed six months' rent then, and he would ask the Attorney General whether it would or would not be the case that nearly two years must elapse before the immediate landlord could get the rent?

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND

said that, as he understood, the head landlord came in on the 1st of May, and there was then due from the sub-tenants half a year's rent. He could sue for that the next day, but he could not bring an ejectment for non-payment of rent until the May following. He must wait until a year's rent was due to himself.

* SIR J. COLOMB

asked whether he was to understand that assuming that a half-year's rent was due on the 1st of May 1896, the landlord could do nothing whatever until May 1897, as far as ejectment was concerned.

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND

Yes.

* SIR J. COLOMB

said that the rent due on the 1st of May 1897, was never paid till November 1897, so that there was really two years—from November 1895 to November 1897—before the landlord could eject.

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND

said the landlord could proceed in the ordinary way by civil bill, but he could not eject until 12 months' rent was owing to himself as landlord from the tenant.

Amendment negatived.

A further Amendment stood on the Paper in the name of Mr. CARSON, and the CHAIRMAN of WAYS and MEANS called upon the hon. and learned Gentleman, when——

MR. CARSON

said he did not intend to move the next or any other Amendment. It was quite apparent that no Amendments of any importance would be accepted, but if they were accepted the Government went back upon them. Consequently, he should not move any further Amendments. [The hon. Gentleman then left the House amidst Nationalist laughter.]

*Mr. SERJEANT HEMPHILL moved to omit the words— ("except in the case of fraud or collusion or of letting at a gross under-value.")

The words he proposed to omit were, he thought, quite unnecessary, and, moreover, would prove unreasonable to the under tenants. The words did not occur in the Bill brought in and read a Second time last year, and on reflection he thought the Chief Secretary would see that they would operate unjustly and unreasonably, because they would give an altogether new right to the superior landlord against the occupying tenant which he did not now enjoy at common law. The whole of the clause was levelled against the middleman who had always proved a fruitful source of trouble and misfortune in Ireland. At no stage of the law had the superior landlord any personal remedy against the occupying tenant under the middleman. The words he wished to omit would create a right which did not previously exist, and their retention would lead to long and expensive litigation, because, the Court would have to go into the question whether there was fraud or collusion, or a letting at a gross under-value between the middleman and the under tenant. If any of these things existed the superior landlord would be entitled to proceed against the under tenant to recover the rent, thus giving him a right which he did not now possess at common law. This was intended to be a remedial Bill in the interest of the tenants, but he thought it would be unreasonable to keep in words which would involve the unfortunate occupying tenant in litigation.

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND

opposed the Amendment. It would, he said, be undesirable to take away the right given by the Bill. The objection taken by his hon. and learned friend was really unnecessary, as no one would be found to suffer by the retention of the words.

Amendment negatived.

On the Motion "That Clause 9 stand part of the Bill,"

MR. T. M. HEALY

pointed out that the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for the University of Dublin (Mr. Carson), had not another Amendment on the Paper when he left the House. They had now passed the tenure clauses of the Bill, and the hon. and learned Gentleman had gone out of the House, having done his work, and having done it effectively.

* SIR J. COLOMB

said it was very undesirable that the tenant should be allowed to get into arrears, and that the immediate landlord in this case should be comparatively powerless in the matter. Would the light hon. Gentleman consider the question between now and Report, with the view, if possible, of amending the Bill in the way he had previously suggested?

MR. GERALD BALFOUR

promised to give the matter his consideration.

Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 10,—