§ MR. O'DOHERTYI beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether his attention has been tailed to the refusal of the Estates Commissioners to pay the half or any portion of the compensation paid to them for land acquired from the occupying tenants for labourers' cottages in the Innishowen rural district, North Donegal; and, if so, whether he will take steps to have the tenants' annual instalments reduced in proportion to the land taken and the proper portion of the compensation granted paid to them.
§ MR. BIRRELLThe Land Commission are unable to identify the particular cases referred to in the Question, as the particulars of the arbitrator's award have I not been notified to the Commissioners, and they have not received the compen- 1106 sation money. Upon the subject generally the Commissioners inform me that there are two kinds of cases to be dealt with. First, the case of direct sales in which purchase agreements have been lodged, but the advances have not yet been made. In these cases, when portions of the holdings are acquired under the Labourers Acts, the Commissioners require that the purchase agreements; should be amended by excluding the plots so acquired and reducing the purchase money as the landlord and tenants may agree. The compensation money in such cases is payable to the owner and tenant and not to the Commissioners. The second class of ease is that in which the lands are already charged with an annuity under the Land Purchase Acts. The annuity is a paramount charge upon the lands, and when any part of such lands is acquired under the Labourers Acts, the proper proportion of the annuity must be redeemed if the local authority is to acquire the land free from encumbrance. When the plot taken is small as compared with the entire holding, or when the annuity has been paid for a considerable number of years, the Commissioners hold that a proportionately smaller part of the compensation may be applied in part redemption of the annuity. But when the plot taken represents the whole or the greater portion of the holding, it is essential that the whole or greater part of the annuity should be redeemed out of the compensation money, if the rates of the county are not to suffer. All compensation moneys received by the Commissioners are applied in full in the redemption pro tanto of the outstanding advances under the Land Acts, and the tenant-purchasers' annuities are reduced accordingly.
§ MR. KILBRIDE (Kildare, S.)asked on what basis—when only a small portion of a farm was taken compulsorily by the local authority—the calculation for compensation was based.
§ MR. BIRRELLEach case has to be considered on its merits. When a small portion of land is taken to provide for labourers' cottages the compensation awarded has, in the first instance, to be so applied as to redeem a pro tanto 1107 amount of the purchase annuity, otherwise there would be no proper security left for the ratepayers. It is a rather difficult job to make the calculation.