§ MR. LONSDALE (Armagh, Mid)To ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland if he will ascertain from the Registrar-General whether the total Poor Law valuation of agricultural holdings in Ireland, as shown in column 2361 24 of Parliamentary Paper [Cd. 4412] and in Table 68 of the General Report of the Census of 1901, namely £10,061,667 is inclusive of the valuation of all demesne lands throughout Ireland, home parks, grazing lands, allotments not exceeding one or two acres in extent let to tenants of labourers' cottages, market gardens and of holdings not coming within the scope of land purchase, and of all descriptions of land comprised in the statutable acreage of Ireland, less the civic area of towns of not less than 2,000 inhabitants, and the acreage of roads, fences, plantations, and other similar tracts; will he state whether the total amount of purchase money under the Land Act of 1903, now estimated by the Estates Commissioners at £183,568,396, is based on the assumption that all such lands, together with agricultural holdings remaining unsold on 1st November, will be sold at the average price for which sales have heretofore been completed under the Act; and, if so, what is the justification for the assumption.
(Answered by Mr. Birrell.) The Census Return of agricultural holdings referred to in the Question includes all occupied land, such as ordinary agricultural holdings, demesne lands, grazing lands, plantations, mountain, and marsh, but does not include land under towns, waste, small gardens in towns and villages, land under railways, and land attached to workhouses and other public institutions. Advances under the Land Purchase Acts can and have been made for the purchase of the various classes of land comprised in the Census Return, including demesnes, home farms, grazing lands, and lands for the purposes of the Labourers Acts. Advances have also been made for lands not included in the Census Return, such as village and town plots and gardens. In making an estimate of the purchase, money of the land unsold on 1st November last, the Estates Commissioners assumed that all lands comprised in the Return would or might be sold under the Land Purchase Acts at the average price of lands already sold under the Act of 1903.