§ Any relief from the payment of Estate Duty given by Sub-section (2) of Section five, or by Sub-section (1) of Section twenty-one of the Finance Act, 1894 (which relate to settled property), or by Subsection (16) of Section twenty-three of that 558 Act (which relates to entailed estates in Scotland) shall cease in the case of any person dying after the fifteenth day of August, nineteen hundred and fourteen, and Settlement Estate Duty shall not be levied in the case of persons dying after the eleventh day of May, nineteen hundred and fourteen.
§ Provided that—
- (a) nothing in this Section shall affect the relief given by the above-mentioned provisions of the Finance Act, 1894, in cases where Estate Duty or any of the duties specified in Subsection (1) of Section twenty-one of that Act have been paid upon the death of one of the parties to a marriage, so far as respects the payment of Estate Duty on the death of the other party to the marriage; and
- (b) on the first occasion on which Estate Duty becomes payable in respect of any property which would not have been payable but for this Section, the amount of Settlement Estate Duty, if any, which has been paid in respect of that property, shall be allowed against the amount of Estate Duty payable on that occasion, and if it exceeds that amount, the excess shall be repaid to the estate.
§ Mr. ROYDS(who was indistinctly heard): I beg to move, to leave out the Clause.
This Clause abolishes Settlement Estate Duty and at the same time abolishes the relief from Estate Duty given by the Finance Act of 1894 in respect of settled property, Estate Duty, of course, being imposed for the first time by that Act. It gave this relief to settled property, for reasons which commended themselves to the authors of that Act, and for the time being relieved settled property from the new imposition placed upon it for the first time by the Act of 1894. After twenty years it is sought, not only to retain the burden which is placed on property by that Act, but to abolish the relief given to settled property, whether that relates to existing settlements or to future settlements. The revenue to be derived this year from the alteration of the law proposed is only the paltry sum of £150,000. Next year the Chancellor of the Exchequer estimates that this alteration will give £900,000 a year to the Exchequer. We are considering, as regards this Finance Bill, 559 mainly, of course, and making pro vision for the needs of the present year, and therefore, if my Amendment is accepted, it will make little or no difference whatever to the revenue of the present year. At the same time, if the Amendment is not accepted Parliament will be sanctioning a most stupendous and fundamental change, as I think without any proper consideration whatever, and I appeal to the House to pause before they make such a considerable alteration of the law which for this year will give such a very trifling sum to the revenue, but may have and will have the most far-reaching effect which none of us at present can contemplate, and which we certainly have not at present considered and have had no opportunity of considering in the short time at our disposal. I leave out for the moment the question of a breach of contract with a person inheriting under existing settlements. The effect of this alteration will, in the first instance, abolish the inducement to make settlements at all, because there is no doubt that since Estate Duty was imposed as a new burden and these relief Clauses were inserted in the Act of 1894, there have been many more settlements effected both of land and personal property, and especially of land, and if this Clause is passed, it will have the effect of abolishing the inducement, which there has been in the past, and is now, to make settlements. It would impose on settled properties, of course, very heavy additional duty, and that duty and burden will be mainly felt, I think, in the case of land.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer drew a comparison between estates which were settled and estates which were unsettled, and thought it was unfair that settled estates should get the benefit of this relief, and said that there was a large number of properties in this country which had descended from father to son from time immemorial, but which had never been settled. I believe that statement to be perfectly correct. Certainly, there are many cases within my own knowledge. But this duty was imposed for the first time in 1894, and before that year exactly the same duty, as far as I know, was payable in respect of settled and unsettled property in land. There was no exemption in favour of settled property, and in those days it made no difference to a man, as regards duty, whether his property was settled or un- 560 settled, and it is for that reason that so many properties have descended from father to son, not being the subject of settlement. But for the first time, in 1894, these very heavy Estate Duties were imposed on land. Prior to 1894 the only duty which was payable on land, whether it was settled or unsettled, was a moderate Succession Duty calculated on the value of the life interest of the person succeeding to the property, and that system prevailed both in regard to settled and unsettled property. In 1894 an attempt was made to put the same duty on personalty and realty, but relief was given in the case of settled property. Owners of land thereupon took advantage of that relief Clause, and they have made many more settlements since 1894 than existed before that date. There is no doubt about that at all. The Chancellor of the Exchequer states also that he wishes to put land and personalty on the same footing. He thinks it is fair that it should be on the same footing. Prior to 1894 land did not pay these heavy Death Duties, and I have always understood that they did not pay them because the owner of the land was annually paying a much greater share of the country's burden in the form of rates and taxes than the owner of personalty.
§ Mr. LLOYD GEORGEindicated dissent.
§ Mr. ROYDSI remember I asked, when I came to look into these things many years ago, why Death Duties were not payable by the owners of land in the same way as by the owners of personal property? And the answer I received was, "How can you expect a man to pay the country's burdens again on his death when he has paid them annually all his lifetime?" That point cannot have been overlooked when the Act of 1894 was passed. Since that date those burdens have increased hugely, and if realty and personalty are to be placed on the same footing, the least that can be done is to place them on the same footing not only as regards Death Duties, but as regards the annual burdens also. And if that was done. I do not know that the owners of realty would have very much fault to find with the proposal. Then the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself has since the 1894 Act placed heavy additional burdens on land. You cannot buy land, and you cannot lease land, without paying double the duties which were paid in 1894. The People's Budget, as it is called, doubled the stamp 561 duties every time land is sold. It doubled the duties every time land is leased, and it placed for the first time an ad valorem duty on voluntary settlements. Under those Sections of the Finance Act about £3,000,000 has been paid. The point has been very much overlooked, but when you wish to compare the position of the owners of land and the owners of personalty, I think it is a point to which prominence should be given. The exact figure which I got from the Chancellor of the Exchequer is £2,965,000 up to April last. In addition to the duties, besides the cost of the valuation of land—I am not referring to the cost to the State, but to the cost to the owners of land—if the owners of land make any profit, they have to pay Increment Value Duty. If an owner is not developing it, he has to pay Undeveloped Land Duty, and at the termination of a lease he has to pay Reversion Duty. If there are minerals, he has to pay Mineral Rights Duty.
All these are new burdens imposed on land by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. When considering the reasons which the right hon. Gentleman gave for introducing this Clause to abolish relief in the case of settled estate these things should not be overlooked—all the additional burdens he has put on land since he has been in office. It is impossible for landed estates to bear the additional burdens. I do not know whether it is the desire of the Chancellor of the Exchequer and other Members of the Government to break up landed estates. Certainly the effect of their legislation has been most disastrous on the agricultural and landed industry, and on the development of land generally, and not only on agriculture, but on building development. I do not think any Member representing a rural constituency would go down to his constituents and tell them that it is desirable in the interests of the country that landed estates should be broken up. The Departmental Committee which reported on this matter found the exact contrary on the evidence brought before them, and yet the effect of the proposal we have now under consideration is to bring about that which the Departmental Committee and all who have the true interests of the country at heart know is fatal to our industry. By way of anticipation of the right hon. Gentleman's reply, I would say that he may tell us, "I must have this sum of money for revenue purposes." As I said before, it is only a paltry sum of £150,000. I would point out to him that next year it will be £900,000, 562 and I would suggest that if he cannot do it now, he should next year repeal the Land and Valuation Clauses of the People's Budget. That will give a clear £1,000,000. It will be the most popular proposal ever put before the country or the House of Commons, and I am sure that a sigh of relief would be given by everyone connected with land and house property if they heard that the People's Budget and all the Land Taxation and valuation proposals were to be repealed.
§ Mr. FITZROYI doubt very much if the House of Commons itself realises the importance of this Clause which we are dealing with at the present moment, and I am quite certain that the country as a whole has no sort of idea of the very far-reaching effect which this Clause will have. In bringing forward this proposal the Chancellor of the Exchequer made some calculations—I have no doubt quite accurate calculations—as to the amount of money which he would receive this year and next year. I do not say for one moment that in giving these figures the Chancellor of the Exchequer wilfully misled the country as to the effect of these proposals, but I am certain that in a few years' time when the full harvest comes to be reached, and when the settled estates come into taxation, instead of the estimate given by the right hon. Gentleman as to the revenue he would receive from these taxes being the correct amount, the revenue will come to a very much larger figure. I quite appreciate the small concession which the Chancellor of the Exchequer promised during the Committee stage of this Bill, and which is embodied in the Amendment that appears on the Paper. It appears to me to be pretty obvious that this concession is in no way a fair compensation for the loss which those who have made these settled estates will have to bear when the settled estates come to be taxed under this Clause. It seems to me pretty obvious also that the direct effect of this Clause in the future will be that there will be very few settled estates at all. I do not propose this evening to argue the merits in favour of settled estates, or to examine the arguments against making settled estates. I think there are very good arguments both for and against. In many respects I think settled estates have had their evil consequences, and in some respects, no doubt, they have had good consequences. But the chief argument, I am quite certain, which appeals to the Chancellor of the Exchequer is that with re- 563 spect to the revenue which he will receive. Of course, that is a very right argument from his point of view for the proposal he is now making.
The chief argument which my hon. Friend (Mr. Royds) advanced in moving the Amendment, was that the effect of this Clause will be detrimental to landed estates. I think that is quite true. The effect of this Clause will be much more detrimental to landed estates than it can possibly be to personal property, and I do not think it is fair on the Chancellor of the Exchequer's part to go into the country and make political capital out of the scarcity of cottages on landed properties, and in some cases to make political capital out of the insecurity of the tenant farmers on large estates. It is quite true that there is a great scarcity of cottages. I do not admit that there is insecurity of tenure on agricultural estates, but if there is any little insecurity of tenure on large agricultural estates, as well as this great scarcity of cottages, I maintain that both those evils are directly due to legislation passed by this House, and more especially to legislation passed by the present Government, If you still further impose taxation on landed property, such as is suggested by this Clause, you are only aggravating the evils which you claim to exist on landed property. To my mind the most important argument against this Clause is that the Government propose to break a contract with those who have settled their estates. There can be no justification, however much you compensate those who are likely to suffer, for breaking a bargain which has been entered into by Parliament with individuals for a consideration, and to deprive them of what they would have got out of their bargain. I listened to a debate the other day on this subject, and neither from the Chancellor of the Exchequer nor the learned Solicitor-General did I hear the slightest argument in justification of this course. If once you start on behalf of Parliament a system of breaking contracts of this importance, there can be no safeguard for any individual in any contract which he makes with the Government.
§ Mr. CHAMBERLAINThe aspects of this Amendment which formed the first part of the speech of my hon. Friend who has just sat down are, I think, important, and give us food for serious reflection. 564 But at the same time they are not the point on which I wish to dwell. I feel very strongly about this Clause. I have often not approved of particular financial expedients to which the Chancellor of the Exchequer has resorted. Sometimes I have thought them inexpedient, and sometimes unjust. But I feel against this proposal a deeper and stronger objection than I do against any proposal which he has yet made to the House of Commons. As my hon. Friend said in conclusion, to me, as to him, this is a proposal that Parliament should commit a breach of faith in dealing with people with whom it has entered into a bargain, from whom it has received consideration from that bargain. The case is a very hard one. The number of people affected is, comparatively speaking, not very large. But in the individual cases the difference made to individual properties or individual people is enormous, and the unexpected, unforeseen, and unforeseeable burden suddenly cast upon them will be sufficient in some cases to break the property, if not to break the individual. If the Chancellor of the Exchequer confined his proposal to the future, if he chose to say that new settlements shall be made only on more onerous terms, and if he liked gradually to discourage the making of settlements by raising those terms, some of the objections raised by my hon. Friend would still apply, but I should have no such feeling on the question as I have at the present-moment. The Chancellor is making this taxation retrospective, and against that, and against that alone, I wish to protest now. I am not unmindful of the concession which the Chancellor of the Exchequer promised yesterday, and which appears in his name on the Paper to-day. I do not want to appear ungracious in dealing with that, but I do not discuss the exemptions which the right hon. Gentleman is proposing to allow, but confine myself to the question of principle raised by the question that the Clause stand part.
The State on the advice of Sir William Harcourt, for reasons which Parliament thought good at the time, gave an inducement to individuals to make settlements in certain cases. Parliament may have been wise; the Minister may have been wise; or both may have been foolish. But it is not suggested anywhere—and I only refer to the matter because of an argument which the Chancellor used on a previous occasion—that any suspicion of corruption tainted the action of that Minister or 565 Parliament. That is common ground between us. But the Chancellor says that if you once recognise the binding force of Parliamentary bargains of this kind you open the way to corrupt bargains. I say that if a bargain is tainted with corruption Parliament may void it, but the fact that some bargain may at some time be tainted with corruption in its inception is no reason for breaking a bargain honestly made which has been honestly conformed to by at least one of the parties. If you pass this Clause you not only withdraw from those who have made these settlements the advantage which you thought fit twenty years ago to give them, but you do not leave them in the position in which they were then, or with power to exercise the same option that they would have had then. Take a man who in pursuance of the Act of 1894 made a settlement soon after and is still living. By the settlement he may have, as he thought, by the payment of money to the Government, which the Government have used, expected to clear two lives, or perhaps three lives, of further payment of this duty. If you had not given him the option, then he would have done as his neighbour did and would have insured. What prospect has he of insuring now when he is twenty years older? He is too old to do it. You cannot put him back. If you could break the bargain, and if in breaking the bargain you could give the same option to choose which he had at the time that the bargain was made, that would conceivably justify what would be a strong action in breaking a Parliamentary bargain. But when you cannot put him back into the same position which he held then, and he is damnified by the mere lapse of time, I do say that it appears to me that Parliament is committing a lamentable breach of faith in making this change. I am obliged to use language so strong, because I am really anxious to carry hon. Members on the other side of the House with me, and I am trying, while my language is strong, not to put any heat into my argument. I cannot say how strongly I feel the gross injustice of the proposal now made in respect of past settlements, the injury done to individuals, the injury to property, and the injury done to the fair fame of Parliament in its reputation for good faith.
§ Mr. LLOYD GEORGEIn spite of what the hon. Gentleman who moved this Amendment stated, we have, I think, on 566 the whole, had a fuller discussion of this particular proposal than of any other proposal in the Budget. I think, if he casts his mind back to the past stages of the Debate on our financial proposals this year, he will find that this one has been discussed on every stage at great length, with great force and vigour, and there is no view of this particular proposal which has not been presented to Parliament, and presented with great strength. Therefore I do not think the hon. Gentleman is doing justice to those who have directed criticism against this proposal when he said that we have not had any discussion upon it. We had hours of Debate upon it in the Committee stage, and before that. The right hon. Gentleman spoke with great moderation as regards the steps we have taken, but I am afraid I cannot accept his argument. I can only repeat the arguments which I have already advanced, but I think it is only due to the House that I should do so after the criticisms which have been made. I come first to the charge of breach of faith. I again protest emphatically against the suggestion that if Parliament in one generation imposes taxation in a certain form, and subject to certain conditions, Parliament in a subsequent generation must respect that particular form of taxation upon a particular class of property. You may have had in a past generation a Parliament which took a different view of a certain kind of taxation—the taxation of a particular class of property, or a particular form of levying taxes upon that property. That is no reason why Parliament in a subsequent generation should hold itself bound by views honestly held by the preceding generation or the preceding decade.
The views held in 1894 are not the views of the present day on either side of the House. In 1894 the Conservative Opposition did not hold the views it holds now upon taxation. I am now speaking of the vast majority of the party opposite at the present moment, if not in the House of Commons, I think, probably, in the country. The view they hold now—the official view they hold now—is not the view they held in 1894; and therefore, while I think one Parliament may honestly, in one decade, take a view with regard to a question of taxation that affects a particular class of property or class of industry, in a subsequent decade Parliament may take a completely different view in regard to it. My contention is 567 that no Parliament has a right to so adjust its taxation as not to leave a subsequent Parliament perfectly free and unfettered to deal with its taxation. Let us put this to the right hon. Gentleman who said that this would only apply to a very few. Supposing it applied to most of the real property of the Kingdom—I am not sure that it does not; I rather think it does—does the right hon. Gentleman mean to say that because a good bargain, if it is a bargain—I am taking his view that it is a bargain, though I do not accept that—but supposing he is right, that it is a good bargain in taxation introduced into the Finance Act, although a Finance Act can never be a bargain, does he mean to say that because a good bargain is introduced into the Finance Act in a particular generation, affecting the whole real property of this Kingdom, that Parliament, it may be thirty, forty, or fifty years after, must have its hands tied with regard to the way in which it is going to tax the whole realty of the Kingdom? If that were the case it would be one of the most serious blows against the power of Parliament—
§ Mr. CHAMBERLAINI want my point to be clear. It is this, that when you have taken money in return for a consideration, you have no right to refuse the consideration without the consent of the other party.
§ 10.0 P.M.
§ Mr. LLOYD GEORGEThat is perfectly true if it were a bargain. A bargain presupposes two equal parties. The House of Commons go to the owners of real property in this country, and say, "If you will give us £2 of your own free will, we will give something in return to you." There might have been something to say to it if the owners of real property had accepted the Budget of 1894, but they fought the Budget Bill from beginning to end—the hon. Gentleman shakes his head—I was a Member of the House, and I can say that never was a Bill fought more strongly than the Budget Bill of 1894. We had majorities, not of twenty-three, I can assure him, for they went down to ten, and I remember that Sir William Harcourt, when there was a majority of fourteen, turned to the Chief Whip and said. "To-night we have actually got fourteen." What is the good of talking about a bargain under those conditions? Here is something which Parliament imposed upon an unwilling class. They said. "You have got to pay £2 for settled property": they also said, "We 568 have altered the 1 per cent. to 2 per cent." There was nothing said with regard to the aggregation which was made in 1900, when the Conservative Government were in power. Why? Because it never entered the head of anyone until the present moment that Parliament was not free and unfettered in any way it thought desirable in the matter of imposing taxation, whether upon realty or personalty. The right hon. Gentleman, in his last few words, seemed to me to carry the idea of a bargain too far. He said that if we put them in exactly the position they were before there might be something to say for it. If this were a tariff Budget, and not a Free Trade Budget, does the right hon. Gentleman mean to say that if, either in the interests of revenue or in the interests of the industry of this country, he found it necessary to make a complete readjustment of taxation which he himself would have imposed, he would have been entitled to do it because the parties to it would not be in the same position? He knows perfectly well that the changes that would be effected by the imposition of a tariff are vastly greater than the differences that would be effected in regard to Settled Estates. I mean the proposal from his own point of view, assuming his argument that by that means you can build great industries by means of a tariff. The right hon. Gentleman, say, five or ten years later, after he imposes the tariff, comes to the conclusion that it is not in the interests of the community that a particular tariff should be quite as high, or that goods on which he had imposed a tariff ought to come in free in the general interests of the community, and he would be perfectly consistent with his position as a Tariff Reformer to make that alteration. Does the right hon. Gentleman mean to say that because he could not put the people who had built up an industry and put enormous capital into it into the same position that he would not be free to alter the tariff, although the whole interests of the community demanded it or the interests of the revenue? By the huge sum of money I refer to I mean not paid to the State but invested on the strength of the Budget, which they would be entitled to treat as a bargain with the State just as much as owners of settled property are. I say, whether it is a Free Trade Chancellor presenting his Budget or a Tariff Reform Chancellor setting up a tariff, if you accept this doctrine, it is 569 absolutely ruinous to the whole finance of this country from any point of view, absolutely! I protest in the strongest possible manner against the notion that you cannot make alterations in the Budget. The Budget is in no sense of the term a bargain with anybody. The same thing was raised, I remember, with regard to the Licensing Duties. They were considered as bargains. Huge buildings had been erected, capital had been invested, and they said, "Here you are, you are altering all that, although you have a bargain with the licensed vintners." It was true to a certain extent, but the Budget is not a bargain. The State does not bargain with a Finance Bill. It does not go to the people as if it were begging for money, and saying to sections of the community, "Will you give us this or that?" On the contrary, the replies of the whole of the people come together and say, "We want so much, and this is the best way of getting that sum." That cannot bind future Parliaments to such an extent that they cannot alter it. I agree with the right hon. Gentleman that you ought to take into account the facts and that at that time you did levy an extra 2 per cent., and that you ought not to treat settled property worse than you are treating free property. That is the only reason, not because there is a bargain, but because otherwise you would be putting settled property in a worse position than free property. Up to the present 1 and 2 per cent. franked the property. As an hon. Gentleman said in the last Debate this is an insurance. Take it on the insurance principle, and up to the present, the premium has covered the risk, and what is still more there are a good many of those risks which have materialised—many of them—so that probably half the settled property which has been franked has already received the benefit of the premium. Then comes the question what about the future? From the moment this Bill becomes an Act the risk ceases to be covered by that agreement. Unless you return that amount or the equivalent, then you are putting settled property in a worse position than property which is not settled—that is our contention.
§ Mr. CHAMBERLAINThe right hon. Gentleman has exactly put my point. He has accepted a premium to cover certain contingencies, and now as the contingencies are maturing, he says, "I will not give 570 you what you have insured for; I return you your premium."
§ Mr. LLOYD GEORGEThe right hon. Gentleman is quite wrong. The right hon. Gentleman treats this as if a premium had been paid for thirty years, and now the risk is maturing. That is not the case. Not merely has it been maturing the whole of this time, but practically half the risks have been already covered. I am talking of settled property as a whole. In individual cases that is not so, but taking settled property as a whole, half the risks have already matured. What proposals do we make now? The proposal we make now is that we shall return, not half the premium, but the whole of the premium, and that for the moment the risk ceases to be covered by the premium—a word which is not mine, but used by hon. Members opposite—we are really going to pay back the premium with interest. I say that puts settled property exactly in the same position as free property. That is our contention. My two contentions are, first of all, that no Parliament can treat a Finance Act as a contract with the people who have been taxed. It has never been accepted by a Chancellor as a theory. The very words used by the right. hon. Gentleman now about this Clause were used in 1853 about Mr. Gladstone's proposal to tax settled property at all. They were used in this House by Mr. Freshfield, a member of a firm of solicitors, who took the solicitor's view about settled property. He said: "Here you are, you have received money in the way of the stamp upon the settlement, and entered into a contract with these people, and you now deliberately go and tax them, and put a succession duty upon settled property." He used the very arguments used by one or two hon. Members opposite. He said: "Had they known this, they never would have made those settlements." It was probably true, but supposing Mr. Gladstone had adopted that view in 1853, settled property would never have been subject to any duty at all, certainly not for a great many years, until every settlement had been exhausted. Therefore I do not think it possible to maintain that view. Subject to that contention, we have done everything we could to meet the exceptional position of the case, so that settled property should not be in a worse position than free property. I have gone beyond the pledge that I gave yesterday, and have inflicted a much more serious loss on the 571 revenue than that pledge involved. Within the limits the Government laid down, I have gone as far as I could to meet the case put forward by owners of settled property. I should like to come to the general arguments put forward by the Mover of the Amendment. The hon. Gentleman who moved the rejection of the Clause used an argument in which the right hon. Gentleman opposite did not follow him. He argued that landed property ought not to be subject to the same taxation of Death Duties as personalty. I thought it very significant that the right hon. Gentleman did not adopt that line of argument. In that respect he showed great discretion, because ho would find it impossible, when his time came, to follow the exalted principles of the hon. Gentleman behind him. The hon. Gentleman said that the reason why landed property ought not to be subject to the same Death Duties as personalty was that land is subject at the present moment to heavier contributions for rates than personalty. Is not that true of capital? Is not that true of machinery? These are not settled property, but they are subject to exactly the same Death Duties as stocks, shares, and so on.
§ Mr. ROYDSMy argument was not that settled property alone, but that all land should be relieved. I include buildings, landed property, realty.
§ Mr. LLOYD GEORGEThe hon. Gentleman was surely addressing himself to the Clause, which raises the question whether settled land property shall be subject to the same taxation as any other property. Factories are very rarely settled, machinery is not settled, and these forms of property are subject to exactly the same taxation in respect of rates as ordinary landed property in the district. As a matter of fact, the rates are very much higher. Take collieries. There are not many cases where collieries are settled. They have to pay the same contribution in respect of Death Duties as land in the ordinary sense of the term, and they have to pay much heavier rates. The hon. Gentleman said, "Here you are increasing the burdens on agricultural land."
§ Mr. LLOYD GEORGEThe hon. Gentleman forgets that most of the money which is being raised is being devoted to 572 the purpose of relieving the burden of rates. In so far as it is not raised for that purpose, it is raised for the purpose of the Navy. The hon. Gentleman may object to lands contributing its fair share towards the burden of the Navy. If ho does not, somebody has to contribute it, and if land is to be exempt it means that every other class of property must contribute a larger proportion. Land is to get its share, and more than its share, of the relief of taxation. Landed property, factories and machinery, are to get their share of the protection of the Navy. The hon. Gentleman's view is that land ought not to contribute towards the expenditure which is to be used for that purpose.
§ Mr. ROYDSI said nothing of the sort. I said that, in my opinion, land was at the present time paying much more than its share, and that the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposed to mulct it in a heavier sum still.
§ Mr. LLOYD GEORGEBut what is the proposition of the hon. Gentleman? Is he not objecting to imposing any further contribution upon landed property, including collieries and factories, as I understand? Somebody has to contribute to make up this money which is to be expended on the Navy and the relief of rates. Unless we increase the burden upon land, equally with other property, it means that we must increase the burdens still further upon personalty and other sources of income. The hon. Gentleman says, "I object to lands being taxed." That means that somebody else has to make up the deficiency. I say that land ought to contribute its fair share—its equal share, certainly.
§ Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKERI must ask the hon. Member, who has made his speech, not to interrupt. I would point out that the right hon. Gentleman is going a great deal beyond the Clause.
§ Mr. LLOYD GEORGEI am sorry, but when you were not here statements were made to which I was replying. I will not pursue that point further. Reference was made to the Stamp Duties. I take it that that matter would be equally irrelevant, therefore I will not pursue it. The hon. Gentleman then dealt with the breaking up of estates. I do not know whether that is relevant. If it is, I should like to say a word about it. The hon. Gentleman 573 suggested that this proposal would have the effect of breaking up estates, and that that would be a bad thing in itself, I do not agree with him at ail. I think it is a good thing. That is my view, as the hon. Gentleman has challenged me on the subject, and I say that the State ought to be prepared for that and to step in. [An HON. MEMBER made an observation which was inaudible in the Reporters' Gallery.] An hon. Member interrupts me. If he has anything to say he will have an opportunity presently if he does take part in the Debate. I hope he will be a little more articulate than he is now. The hon. Gentleman (Mr. Royds) said that this proposal would discourage settlements. I am not alarmed at that—not in the slightest degree. I do not think that that is a bad thing in itself. I am not prepared to defend the system by which a man can arrange for all time that one member of a family shall receive an income. I do not think it is the business of the State to go out of its way to perpetuate a system of that kind. If it can be arranged, that is a matter for the family itself. But that the State should go out of its way to discriminate in its taxation, to give better terms in order to encourage a notion of that kind, is, I think, thoroughly anti-social, thoroughly anti-economic, and a thoroughly bad thing for the community. I am only putting that proposition because the hon. Member himself challenged a debate upon it. I think I have dealt, in so far as the points made by the Member are relevant, with practically the whole of them. I have defended this on the grounds I have given. Hon. Members themselves admit that the present settlement Estate Duty gives an advantage to settled property. I say that it is a perfectly unfair thing as between settled and free property. I say that the estates which now go down in families without settlement pay their fair share of taxation, and that those which go down settled do not pay their fair share. It is unequal as between the same classes of property, and it is utterly unequal as between realty and personalty. It is because I think it is right that they should bear their fair and equal share, that I support this proposal.
§ Mr. WORTHINGTON EVANSI do not propose to discuss this on the ground that it is equal or unequal as between real property and personal property, or to follow the Chancellor of the Exchequer on the lines that he has laid down as to whether it is desirable or not desirable to encour- 574 age settlements. A discussion on this subject would be extremely interesting, but I think if these arguments were really pursued, you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, would probably call us to order. The real point which the Chancellor of the Exchequer has endeavoured to avoid and to prevent the House from considering is this: whether the State is entitled to go back on a bargain which it has made with the subject, or whether the State is not so entitled? Hitherto we have always thought that a bargain was a bargain. We thought in our simple philosophy that that concluded the matter. We thought that when between free individuals a bargain was made the Courts would enforce that bargain—unless it were an illegal bargain or a gambling contract—then there are special exceptions which prevent these contracts being enforced—that the State would use its legal machinery to enforce this bargain. Here the State is proposing to do something which is not sticking to its bargain at all. It is cancelling a bargain because one party to the bargain has tired of it, and thinks it ought to be revoked. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has said in mitigation of this great breach of bargain that it cannot be judged on insurance lines. He has said that it is quite true that the State has accepted the premium for that bargain, but that at least half the risk has been run, and therefore, for one reason or another, the State is entitled to cancel this insurance bargain and to pay back the premium without interest from a date that the State chooses. In justification of that alteration of position as between the State and the subject, the Chancellor says that the risk has greatly increased.
It was a very interesting defence. Let us see how the right hon. Gentleman would deal with a similar case if it were a bargain between himself, a private individual, and an insurance company. Suppose when the right hon. Gentleman was younger, say, at the age of thirty, some insurance company had insured him at a premium equal to £2 15s. for the sum of £1,000 payable at death. Suppose that premium were a lump-sum premium, not a yearly premium. The former is a common form of insurance. Suppose, therefore, in lieu of paying the annual premium of £2 15s., the right hon. Gentleman had paid £300, as premium for the insurance of £1,000 at his death. I submit that that case is parallel with the case we are now discussing. Supposing then the insurance 575 company had said to him, twenty years after, when he was fifty, "It is true that we received a premium from you of £300, but the risk has altered; you are now fifty years old, and the risk has increased; we will not take you now at £300; if you were to be insured over again the risk would be worth £600." They might say, "Well, we will be generous. We will give you back your £300, not with interest from the day you paid it. You must not expect that; half of the risk has been run. You might have died at thirty-five, or forty, or forty-five. We will give you back your premium. Do not say that we are not keeping our bargain, and we will fix the date from which the risk is to run, and we will cancel the bargain." How does that differ from the proposition we are now discussing? Yet the Chancellor of the Exchequer defends his position to-day by saying half the risk is run, and therefore he will pay back the premium. Does any hon. Member think that that is not a fair illustration of what is happening under this Clause? Because if there is any doubt, one can draw the parallel quite close. What is happening here is the State has the interest at 2 per cent.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer does not want to talk about Stamp Duty. As a matter of fact the subject has not only paid 2 per cent., but the Stamp Duty is 1 per cent. now, though it used to be a half per cent. However, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer does not want the Stamp Duty to be taken into account, we will leave that alone. The State has received 2 per cent., according to the Chancellor's own statement, as insurance premium, as against the payment of a lump sum called Estate Duty on a certain given event, namely, the death of certain people. This is indistinguishable from a life policy in an insurance office. If the insurance office were to repudiate its bargain, and if the learned solicitor opposite acted for the claimant, anyone can imagine the tones of indignation in which he would denounce that breach of the bargain by the insurance office. Yet it will be his painful duty now to get up and say, "Although this would be utterly and absolutely wrong in the case of a life insurance office, governed only by the ordinary dictates of common morality, we claim on behalf of a Liberal Government that we are entitled to do it," and he will defend it. There is no justification for the Clause as it stands. It is quite true there 576 has been some modification, but what does it mean? It means that they will not steal £100 from people with whom they have made a bargain, but they will steal by this slight modification, £90. We ought to be thankful for the slight modification, I suppose, but it does not touch the Clause which is a repudiation of State liability, and a breach of honesty which would be condemned by any honest man.
§ Mr. PETOI think that part of the speech of the Chancellor of the Exchequer in which he dealt with the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham is the most amazing we have ever heard from the Front Bench on any financial question in this House. First of all, the right hon. Gentleman tried to argue that because a bargain had been made a generation ago, and because we object to the repudiation of that bargain, it was an argument that no alteration could ever be made in the tax of one generation because another generation might take another view. That would have been absolutely relevant to the question of whether the Tea Duty should be reduced from 5d. to 4d., but it is absolutely irrelevant to the argument put forward by the Member for West Birmingham. In this case there is a deliberate bargain entered into in which the subject had the option of taking one course or another. Inducements were held out to him, and the decision was taken according to the legislation of the time. Supposing this had been a question of a tariff. The right hon. Gentleman quotes the United States, and says that they altered their tariffs. He need not have gone into a specific case of that kind, because it is well known in this and every other country that a tariff may be imposed from year to year and the details of that tariff are liable to be changed at any time in the interests of the community at large.
The whole question is that the essence of a bargain exists between the taxpayer and the State in this matter. The right hon. Gentleman says he has not been so unfair as has been made out, and he says that 50 per cent. of the people who took that option have found that they have made a good bargain because the estate under that settlement has already passed. But what remains of the other 50 per cent.? What does that argument amount to? That you only propose to defraud the 50 per cent. of the people you entered into the bargain with, and you take the attitude of being on a 577 highly moral plane, and say that you are perfectly justified in leaving the other 50 per cent., who have already paid up the consideration and now find that they have paid it for absolutely no value received. The last argument the right hon. Gentleman used was that in 1853 the same thing was argued. It was, he said, the same thing as Mr. Freshfield argued, that because a Stamp Duty had been paid on settlement the State was precluded from putting any other duty on settled estates. That was certainly not a strong position to take up, and that is not the case put forward by the Member for West Birmingham at all. It is said that because there is some duty charged in stamps or otherwise upon settlements, therefore, the State cannot charge another duty. The proposition is wholly different. It is that because these settlements were entered into you are not now entitled to take away all the advantages you then offered in consideration of the Settled Estates Duty which you then imposed.
That is a totally different question. In one case it is a question of two distinct taxes. Mr. Deputy-Speaker has ruled that the question of stamps is irrelevant on the ground that it is a wholly different duty, and yet the Chancellor of the Exchequer brings forward that question as being analogous to the present case. The Chancellor of the Exchequer says: "Why not place some further burden upon land and upon settled estates? What is the purpose of the present Budget? It is that in so far as it is not going to the support of the Navy, it is going to the relief of the rates." Let us consider that proposition for one moment. There are £9,000,000 in round figures to be found for the relief of rates. I understand that five-sixths of that sum will go to the relief of urban rates, and there remains one-sixth, £1,500,000 for rural rates. In exchange for that £1,450,000 is to be given up. The net result of this great Budget for the relief of rates, so far as agricultural land is concerned, will amount to £50,000 a year. It is proposed to rescind a perfectly fair and clearly understood bargain which was entered into, and for which consideration was paid because half, or possibly half of those who paid their money may have got something from the people who now say they are going to repudiate the other half of the bargain. What is the initial inducement offered? Because a net sum of £50,000 a year may ultimately be available for the relief of rural rates, we are to go back upon the bargain that was 578 made in respect of settled property, and are to sacrifice a great deal more than money—the honour of this Assembly.
§ Sir A. MARKHAMI have had some hesitation during the course of this Budget in supporting this Settlement Estate Duty, but after the concession made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer last night I think the House must find itself in a very different position. We had a very querulous speech from the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr. Pretyman), and, if it had remained where it was last night, this concession would not have been made at all. These attacks on the Government indirectly stating that they are nothing but a body of thieves, who repudiates contracts, merely for the purpose of penalising one section of the community as against the other, are not calculated to get the Government to take the view expressed from those benches. Hon. Members say that this is a dishonest Clause, but let the House approach the question from the common-sense point of view. Why is it necessary to take this step? The hon. Member who moved the omission of the Clause said that no further taxation ought to be put on land, that no further taxation ought to be put on factories, and thta no further taxation ought to be put on collieries. Where is he going to get his money from? The hon. Member for Colchester (Mr. Worthington Evans) said that this was a case similar to that of a man who goes to an insurance company and makes a bargain with them. Surely that is not an analogous case. I know that the Chancellor of the Exchequer said so, but I do not agree with him, and I did not agree with him with regard to the Licensing Duties. When the Licensing Bill was passing through this House the Chancellor of the Exchequer said that if the duties were altered he would do his utmost to get them rescinded when a Liberal Government came into office. Therefore, the law was clearly established in the case of Sharp v. Wakefield. There was no analogy, nor is there any analogy in the case of Tariff Reform, because anyone who votes for hon. Gentlemen opposite on the understanding that they are to have a preference will know that if this party comes into power there will be no preference.
Therefore, I do not agree with either of the propositions thus put forward by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. But the case of the insurance company is different. A man who goes to an insurance company does so of his own free will. He 579 enters into insurance for the purpose of getting certain benefits Parliament imposes a duty in the form of an Estate Duty or Settlement Estate Duty, for the purpose of raising revenue; and the man, whether he likes it or not, has to pay. Parliament having increased very largely the Estate Duties, we find ourselves in this position. People who have settled their property are in an extremely favourable position. The whole question turns on this. A man having entered into what the hon. Member terms a bargain with the State, ought Parliament to say that that bargain cannot at any time hereafter be broken? [An HON. MEMBER: "With that particular individual."] Yes, with that particular individual. I think it would have been better if the Government had reserved all existing settlements. But then they had to get the money, and one has to have regard as to where they get it from.
§ Mr. WORTHINGTON EVANSYou are not entitled to rob the man.
§ Sir A. MARKHAMYou are not robbing him, because, by the Amendment which the Government accepted last night, you are going to put him in no worse position than he was before. You are going to give him back his money—I think he should have been given 4 per cent. instead of 3 per cent.—and you are also going to put him in no worse position. I think, taking account of the large sum of money that had to be raised, and bearing in mind that the money in going back in relief of local rates—[An HON. MEMBER: "You cannot break a bargain!"]—I do not recognise it as a bargain, because the State has to deal with all these questions having regard to the interest of the State as a whole. From time to time the Estate Duties have been increased until they have been brought up to a very high figure, and certain people have been placed in a favourable position, and have escaped the duty by paying 2 per cent. Taking all the circumstances into consideration, having regard to the large sum of money which had to be raised by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, having regard, too, to the fact that he is paying back this money and is putting these people in a position no worse than they were in before, having also given them the benefit of insurance during that period, I think we may—although with some hesitation—vote for the Government proposal.
§ Mr. PRETYMANI do not wish to make another speech on this question, but I cannot help expressing my sympathy with the hon. Member opposite who, as an honest man, has been trying his best to defend this proposal. Even now I do not think he really appreciates quite what the proposal amounts to. If he is not convinced that the owners of settled property are now, under the amended Clause, put in the same position as they would have been had this duty not been imposed, I think I can claim he should follow us into the Lobby.
§ Sir A. MARKHAMIf you can show me that they are not I will.
§ Mr. PRETYMANI can show that they are not put in the same position. A man who under the existing law—I am assuming that this Bill will not become an Act—paid Settlement Estate Duty on succeeding to an estate made a payment in consideration of which the State gave him a certificate franking the estate from payment of further Duty during the settlement, as an individual bargain with him. That frank the State now withdraws. That is what we consider a breach of contract and going back upon a bargain. The hon. Member says that by this Clause, as now drawn, the man is going to be put in the same position. He is not. In the first place, had this Clause then been in existence he would have insured his life at the age he succeeded to the property. This is not an imaginary case, because within a few days of this Clause appearing on the Paper I received a letter from a gentleman who is tenant for life of settled property, and who said "I am by this put in a most unfortunate position. I succeeded at the age of about thirty to this settled estate, and I could have insured my life then at a comparatively low figure. I am now fifty-four years of age, and I cannot insure my life except at a premium more than double, which I cannot afford, to cover this."
§ Sir A. MARKHAMHe has the capitalised value of the insurance premiums in his pocket.
§ Mr. PRETYMANNot necessarily. That is not a fair view to take. That may have been spent on the estate or in any other way. He has had that income free to dispose of. So far as the estate is concerned, it cannot be covered against this duty on the same terms it would have been covered had this Clause been in existence at the 581 time he succeeded. May I put it to hon. Members from the point of view of those who are interested in settled property, a point of view which may, perhaps, be new to them. Those who own landed property do not look upon ownership in the same light as those who own personal property, or as being simply an individual matter. The family to which they belong, their predecessors, have owned that property, perhaps, for many generations They have a life interest in the property and desire to hand it down to future generations and to do their duty by it while they have it. They look upon a duty of this kind, not so much from the point of view of the way in which it hits the individual, but from its effect upon the property as a whole, and as a family possession. This is a blow at the property at every point. The object with which this insurance has been paid is to keep up the property. Those who have owned property under these terms look upon the claim of the estate to expenditure for maintenance as the first claim upon the income. Their own personal expenditure comes in after that.
The effect upon these settled properties of this enormous increase in the duties, which has not been insured against, and, because this Clause was not in existence, could not be insured against at the time the Settlement Estate Duty was paid, is not so much to injure the particular individual who has to pay the tax, but to withdraw the life-blood of the property, and to preclude the next successor, who who will have to pay this enormous duty, from expending the necessary sums to maintain the necessary capital expenditure required by the property. Therefore, when you are doing this you are injuring not the individual only, but the property and everybody upon it, and you have not placed him in the same position, because he cannot insure on the same terms as he could before.
§ Sir A. MARKHAMHe cannot eat his cake and have it.
§ Mr. PRETYMANCertainly not; but a man may eat his cake, and he was entitled to eat it, under the bargain he made with the State, and had the State not made a definite bargain with him to grasp his property he would not have eaten the cake. There is another effect of this which to my knowledge is occurring in actual practice. 582 Who do you think are going to suffer? The younger children of the tenants for life of settled property. The owners of settled property, who have been not eating their cake, but saving up out of their income some of the cake for the younger children, find that the bargain which they had made with the State is broken, and a very large sum will have to be paid by their successors. Under these circumstances, the successor will be unable to do his duty by the estate, and individuals in that position have actually altered their wills, and been obliged to do so, depriving their younger children of a large proportion of the savings which they had made for them, and devoting that money to enable the eldest son to do his duty by the property when he succeeds. This House is acting very unfairly towards individuals when it has franked the property. I do not think the Chancellor of the Exchequer's argument applies at all as to the right of the House to alter legislation. No one has contested it, and everyone will agree that when the State alters a rate of taxes, when a tariff is imposed or taken off or altered, all kinds of business and financial arrangements will be affected. People may complain, but there is no breach of a definite individual bargain or consideration of which money has been paid between the State and any individual. The case is absolutely different. Parliament always must have the absolute right to alter any taxation, whether to diminish it or to increase it, and cannot be hampered in that by the question of whether this or that particular individual interest is going to be prejudiced or benefited. I entirely admit that, but those alterations cannot be made retrospective in regard to definite bargains which the State has already entered into with individuals.
If I wanted to reinforce that I have only to take a case in point of this very Clause, when in the Budget of 1909–10 the Chancellor of the Exchequer increased the insurance rate from 1 per cent. to 2 per cent. and did not make it retrospective. He did not say to the people who had made the bargain at 1 per cent.: "I am entitled to make you pay 2 per cent." He only said to those who had not entered into the bargain, "Those who make this bargain with the State will have to pay 2 per cent., and not 1 per cent." In that he 583 followed definite precedent that this kind of legislation cannot be retrospective, and that is the whole point of our bitter complaint. We do not approve of the extra burden put upon agriculture. I agree, not that there ought to be no burdens on agriculture, not that the burdens on agriculture or land or collieries ought not to be increased, but they ought to be equalised over the whole area, not that you should take this or that or the other tax, but taking the whole area of taxation, the burdens ought to be equally divided between one kind of property and another, and it is no justification of this tax to say that if you do not put it on, someone else will have to bear it, unless you can show that if other people had to bear it their total burden would then be greater in proportion to their ability to pay than that which is being paid.
§ Sir A. MARKHAMThat is what the hon. Member who moved the omission of the Clause said.
§ Mr. PRETYMANI think that is what the Chancellor of the Exchequer said that the hon. Member said. That is something very different. I listened very carefully to my hon. Friend, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, as usual, misquoted the argument of his opponent. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] I do not wish to be offensive, but it is the case. It has been done over and over again. It is constantly done. [Interruption.] I do not wish to complain of the Chancellor of the Exchequer's attitude. I wish to be perfectly fair to him. [An HON. MEMBER: "Where is he?"] He said he had to go, and my hon. Friend referred to his necessary absence. I do not wish to complain of his absence, but I do complain that when he refers to arguments used he does not fairly repeat the phrases in which those arguments were put forward. I do appeal to hon. Members on the opposite side of the House that it is not necessary for this tax to go back upon a bargain definitely made with individuals. I cannot, and nobody on this side of the House can, absolve any individual Member on the other side. Party loyalty does not justify this dishonest action, and every Member on that side who, after hearing this Debate, supports the Clause must know that he is supporting a de- 584 parture from honest principle, and supporting a precedent which this House may some day regret. It is one which, so far as I am aware, has no Parliamentary precedent.
§ Sir S. BUCKMASTERThe hon. and gallant Member (Mr. Pretyman) obviously thinks that this Clause is so easy of defence that five minutes is abundant time. [An HON. MEMBER: "Who guillotined it?"]
§ Mr. PRETYMANI did not know that the hon. and learned Gentleman was going to speak. I am very sorry.
§ Sir S. BUCKMASTERThe hon. and gallant Member evidently thinks that five minutes is abundant time to answer the various arguments adduced against the Clause. I had the advantage of hearing the whole of the Debate, both in Committee and on Report, and I think the Debate to-night, with one or two exceptions, has been of great assistance in helping me to form my opinion on this Clause. I refer particularly to the speeches of the hon. Members who moved and seconded this Amendment, and whose speeches travelled over new ground and gave new matters for reflection. I would like to say, if I may, with all respect, what a contrast it was to hear the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham (Mr. Chamberlain) as compared with the violent and vituperative efforts of the hon. Member for Colchester (Mr. Worthington Evans). There is one remarkable fact about this Debate, and that is that, with only one exception, no Member who has spoken on the other side of the House has suggested that the proposals we have made for replacing the duty and replacing the interest are not in themselves a fair and just equivalent for the protection which is now withdrawn. I think the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham did not deal with it all. What he dealt with was the question that occupied the minds of most of the hon. Members opposite, namely, whether or not we are breaking a bargain, and not whether we are putting people back into the position in which they were before. This phrase about people breaking a bargain is, surely, one of the most misleading phrases ever used in regard to an alteration in an Act of Parliament.
585 The very essence of a bargain is that a man is at liberty to enter into, or to refuse to enter into it, as he pleases. The imposition of Estate Duty was rot optional, and the Settlement Estate Duty was not optional. Every settled property settled by the will of a person who died after 1894 was, whether he liked it or not, bound to pay the extra burden which the Settlement Estate Duty imposed, and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham gave an illustration of a case that could never arise, because he suggested that a man who was at liberty to make a settlement would there and then pay the Settlement Estate Duty, and by doing that would frank the settlement to the last hour when it existed. In point of fact, nothing of the kind exists, and the man making a settlement, whether he made it now or then, would never pay any Settlement Estate Duty at all, nor would he undertake to do it. The Settlement Estate Duty is only payable when death occurs under the settlement, or when a man by his will having disposed of his property, disposes of some, or the whole of it, by way of settling it. I do not want to make too much of this, but I do not think that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham could have given an illustration which I would be glad to give and deal with, if time permitted. The real thing is this. We are now readjusting the deduction which the Act of 1894 imposed,
§ and we recognise that it is perfectly impossible when you are imposing or changing duties to depend upon the unforeseen and wholly immeasurable accident of death, and so when we impose them or change them there will always be inequalities as between man and man or between estate and estate. There must be irregularity, but what we submit is that as far as possible we have attempted by this Budget to do two things: to place settled and unsettled property upon the same footing—that is our avowed object, and it is one that we know is unpalatable to hon. Members opposite—and at the same time to prevent any person suffering any financial disadvantage from any payment of duty which was made at an earlier date.
§ It being Eleven of the clock, Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER proceeded, pursuant to the Order of the House of the 8th July, to put forthwith the Question on the Amendment already proposed from the Chair.
§ Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out, to the word 'estate' ["in cases where estate duty or any of the duties"], stand part of the Bill."
§ The House divided: Ayes, 263; Noes, 182.
589| Division No. 197.] | AYES. | [11.0 p.m. |
| Abraham, William (Dublin, Harbour) | Bryce, J. Annan | Dewar, Sir J. A. |
| Acland, Francis Dyke | Buckmaster, Sir Stanley O. | Dillon, John |
| Adamson, William | Burns, Rt. Hon. John | Doris, William |
| Addison, Dr. Christopher | Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas | Duffy, William J. |
| Adkins, Sir W. Ryland D. | Buxton, Noel (Norfolk, North) | Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness) |
| Agar-Robartes, Hon. T. C. R. | Carr-Gomm, H. W. | Duncan, Sir J. Hastings (Yorks, Otley) |
| Ainsworth, John Stirling | Cawley, Harold T. (Lancs., Heywood) | Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor) |
| Allen, Arthur A. (Dumbartonshire) | Chancellor, Henry George | Elverston, Sir Harold |
| Allen, Rt. Hon. Charles P. (Stroud) | Chapple, Dr. Wiliam Allen | Esmonde, Dr. John (Tipperary, N.) |
| Armitage, Robert | Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S. | Esmonde, Sir Thomas (Wexford, N.) |
| Arnold, Sydney | Clancy, John Joseph | Esslemont, George Birnie |
| Baker, Harold T. (Accrington) | Clough, Wiliam | Fenwick, Rt. Hon. Charles |
| Baker, Joseph Allen (Finsbury, E.) | Clynes, John R. | Ffrench, Peter |
| Balfour, Sir Robert (Lanark) | Collins, Godfrey P. (Greenock) | Field, William |
| Baring, Sir Godfrey (Barnstaple) | Collins, Sir Stephen (Lambeth) | Fiennes, Hon. Eustace Edward |
| Barnes, George N. | Compton-Rickett, Rt. Hon. Sir J. | Fitzgibbon, John |
| Barran, Sir John N. (Hawick Burghs) | Cornwall, Sir Edwin A. | Flavin, Michael Joseph |
| Beale, Sir William Phipson | Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth) | France, Gerald Ashburner |
| Beck, Arthur Cecil | Crooks, William | Furness, Sir Stephen Wilson |
| Benn, W. W. (T. Hamlets, St. George) | Crumley, Patrick | Gelder, Sir W. A. |
| Bentham, George Jackson | Cullinan, John | George, Rt. Hon. D. Lloyd |
| Birrell, Rt. Hon. Augustine | Dalziel, Rt. Hon. Sir J. H. (Kirkcaldy) | Gladstone, W. G. C. |
| Black, Arthur W. | Davies, David (Montgomery Co.) | Glanville, Harold James |
| Boland, John Plus | Davies, Ellis William (Eifion) | Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford |
| Booth, Frederick Handel | Davies, Timothy (Lincs., Louth) | Goldstone, Frank |
| Bowerman, Charles W. | Davies, Sir W. Howell (Bristol, S.) | Greenwood, Hamar (Sunderland) |
| Boyle, Daniel (Mayo, North) | Dawes, James Arthur | Grey, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward |
| Brady, Patrick Joseph | Delany, William | Griffith, Rt. Hon. Ellis Jones |
| Brocklehurst, W. B. | Denman, Hon. Richard Douglas | Guest, Hon. Frederick E. (Dorset, E.) |
| Brunner, John F. L. | Devlin, Joseph | Gulland, John William |
| Gwynn, Stephen Lucius (Galway) | Meehan, Francis E. (Leitrim, N.) | Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke) |
| Hackett, John | Meehan, Patrick J. (Queen's Co., Leix) | Roche, Augustine (Louth) |
| Hancock, John George | Middlebrook, William | Roe, Sir Thomas |
| Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose) | Millar, James Duncan | Rowlands, James |
| Hardie, J. Keir | Molloy, Michael | Rowntree, Arnold |
| Harmsworth, Cecil (Luton, Beds) | Molteno, Percy Alport | Runciman, Rt. Hon. Walter |
| Harvey, A. G. C. (Rochdale) | Mond, Rt. Hon. Sir Alfred | Russell, Rt. Hon. Thomas W. |
| Harvey, T. E. (Leeds, West) | Montagu, Hon. E. S. | Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland) |
| Hayden, John Patrick | Mooney, John J. | Samuel, J. (Stockton-on-Tees) |
| Hayward, Evan | Morgan, George Hay | Scanlan, Thomas |
| Helme, Sir Norval Watson | Morrell, Philip | Scott, A. MacCallum (Glas., Bridgeton) |
| Henderson, Arthur (Durham) | Morison, Hector | Seely, Rt. Hon. Colonel J. E. B. |
| Henry, Sir Charles | Muldoon, John | Sheehy, David |
| Higham, John Sharp | Munro, Rt. Hon. Robert | Sherwell, Arthur James |
| Hinds, John | Murphy, Martin J. | Shortt, Edward |
| Hobhouse, Rt. Hon. Charles E. H. | Murray, Captain Hon. Arthur C. | Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir John Allsebrook |
| Hedge, John | Needham, Christopher T. | Smith, Albert (Lancs., Clitheroe) |
| Hogge, James Myles | Nicholson, Sir Charles N. (Doncaster) | Smith, H. B. Lees (Northampton) |
| Holt, Richard Durning | Nolan, Joseph | Smyth, Thomas F. (Leitrim, S.) |
| Hope, John Deans (Haddington) | Norton, Captain Cecil William | Strauss, Edward A. (Southwark, West) |
| Howard, Hon. Geoffrey | Nugent, Sir Walter Richard | Sutherland, John E. |
| Hudson, Walter | Nuttall, Harry | Sutton, John E. |
| Hughes, Spencer Leigh | O'Brien, Patrick (Kilkenny) | Taylor, John W. (Durham) |
| Illingworth, Percy H. | O'Connor, T. P. (Liverpool) | Taylor, Thomas (Bolton) |
| Jones, Edgar (Merthyr Tydvil) | O'Doherty, Philip | Tennant, Rt. Hon. Harold John |
| Jones, H. Haydn (Merioneth) | O'Donnell, Thomas | Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton) |
| Jones, J. Towyn (Carmarthen, East) | O'Dowd, John | Thorne, William (West Ham) |
| Jones, Leif (Notts, Rushcliffe) | O'Malley, William | Toulmin, Sir George |
| Jones, William S. Glyn- (Stepney) | O'Neill, Dr. Charles (Armagh, S.) | Trevelyan, Charles Philips |
| Jowett, Frederick William | O'Shaughnessy, P. J. | Verney, Sir Harry |
| Joyce, Michael | O'Sullivan, Timothy | Walsh, Stephen (Lancs., Ince) |
| Kellaway, Frederick George | Palmer, Godfrey Mark | Walton, Sir Joseph |
| Kelly, Edward | Parker, James (Halifax) | Ward, W. Dudley (Southampton) |
| Kennedy, Vincent Paul | Parry, Thomas H. | Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan) |
| Kenyon, Barnet | Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek) | Watt, Henry Anderson |
| Kilbride, Denis | Pearce, William (Limehouse) | Wedgwood, Josiah C. |
| King, Joseph | Phillips, John (Longford, S.) | White, J. Dundas (Glasgow, Tradeston) |
| Lambert, Rt. Hon. G. (Devon, S. Molton) | Pirie, Duncan V. | White, Sir Luke (Yorks, E.R.) |
| Lambert, Richard (Wilts, Cricklade) | Pratt, J. W. | White, Patrick (Meath, North) |
| Law, Hugh A. (Donegal, West) | Price, C. E. (Edinburgh, Central) | Whitehouse, John Howard |
| Lawson, Sir W. (Cumb'rld, Cockerm'th) | Priestley, Sir W. E. B. (Bradford, E.) | Whittaker, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P. |
| Levy, Sir Maurice | Primrose, Hon. Neil James | Whyte, Alexander F. (Perth) |
| Lewis, Rt. Hon. John Herbert | Radford, George Heynes | Wiles, Thomas |
| Low, Sir Frederick (Norwich) | Raffan, Peter Wilson | Wilkie, Alexander |
| Lundon, Thomas | Rea, Rt. Hon. Russell (South Shields) | Williams, Aneurin (Durham, N.W.) |
| Lynch, Arthur Alfred | Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough) | Williams, Penry (Middlesbrough) |
| Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs) | Reddy, Michael | Williamson, Sir Archibeld |
| Macdonald, J. Ramsay (Leicester) | Redmond, John E. (Waterford) | Wilson, Rt. Hon. J. W. (Worcs., N.) |
| McGhee, Richard | Redmond, William (Clare, E.) | Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton) |
| Maclean, Donald | Redmond, William Archer (Tyrone, E.) | Winfrey, Sir Richard |
| MacVeagh, Jeremiah | Rendall, Athelstan | Wing, Thomas Edward |
| M'Callum, Sir John M. | Richardson, Albion (Peckham) | Wood, Rt. Hon. T. McKinnon (Glasgow) |
| McKenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald | Richardson, Thomas (Whitehaven) | Yeo, Alfred William |
| M'Laren, Hon. F. W. S. (Lincs., Spalding) | Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln) | Young, William (Perthshire, East) |
| Manfield, Harry | Roberts, George H. (Norwich) | Yoxall, Sir James Henry |
| Markham, Sir Arthur Basil | Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs) | |
| Marks, Sir George Croydon | Robertson, Sir G. Scott (Bradford) | TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. |
| Marshall, Arthur Harold | Robertson, John M. (Tyneside) | William Jones and Mr. Webb. |
| Meagher, Michael | Robinson, Sidney | |
| NOES. | ||
| Agg-Gardner, James Tynte | Bird, Alfred | Coates, Major Sir Edward Feetham |
| Aitken, Sir William Max | Boscawen, Sir Arthur S. T. Griffith- | Courthope, George Loyd |
| Amery, L. C. M. S. | Bowden, G. R. Harland | Craig, Captain James (Down, E.) |
| Archer-Shee, Major M. | Boyton, James | Craig, Norman (Kent, Thanet) |
| Ashley, Wilfrid W. | Bridgeman, William Clive | Craik, Sir Henry |
| Baird, John Lawrence | Bull, Sir William James | Croft, H. P. |
| Baker, Sir Randolf L. (Dorset, N.) | Burn, Colonel C. R. | Dalrymple, Viscount |
| Baldwin, Stanley | Butcher, John George | Denison-Pender, J. C. |
| Banbury, Sir Frederick George | Campbell, Captain Duncan F. (Ayr, N.) | Denniss, E. R. B. |
| Banner, Sir John S. Harmood- | Campion, W. R. | Dickson, Rt. Hon. C. Scott |
| Barlow, Montague (Salford, South) | Carlile, Sir Edward Hildred | Dixon, C. H. |
| Barnston, Harry | Cassel, Felix | Du Cros, Arthur Philip |
| Barrie, H. T. | Cautley, Henry Strother | Duke, Henry Edward |
| Bathurst, Hon. A. B. (Gloucester, E.) | Cave, George | Du Pre, W. Baring |
| Bathurst, Charles (Wilts, Wilton) | Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor) | Eyres-Monsell, Bolton M. |
| Beach, Hon. Michael Hugh Hicks | Cecil, Lord R. (Herts, Hitchin) | Faber, George Denison (Clapham) |
| Beckett, Hon. Gervase | Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. J. A. | Faber, Captain W. V. (Hants, W.) |
| Benn, Arthur Shirley (Plymouth) | Clay, Captain H. H. Spender | Fell, Arthur |
| Benn, Ion Hamilton (Greenwich) | Clive, Captain Percy Archer | Fisher, Rt. Hon. W. Hayes |
| Bigland, Alfred | Clyde, J. Avon | Fletcher, John Samuel |
| Foster, Philip Staveley | Larmor, Sir J. | Rutherford, Watson (L'pool, W. Derby) |
| Ganzoni, Francis John C. | Law, Rt. Hon. A. Bonar (Bootle) | Salter, Arthur Clavell |
| Gastrell, Major W. Houghton | Lloyd, George Ambrose (Stafford, W.) | Samuel, Sir Harry (Norwood) |
| Gibbs, George Abraham | Lloyd, George Butler (Shrewsbury) | Samuel, Samuel (Wandsworth) |
| Gilmour, Captain John | Locker-Lampson, G. (Salisbury) | Sanders, Robert Arthur |
| Glazebrook, Captain Philip K. | Locker-Lampson, O. (Ramsey) | Sanderson, Lancelot |
| Goldman, C. S. | Lowe, Sir F. W. (Birm., Edgbaston) | Sandys, G. J. |
| Goldsmith, Frank | Lyttelton, Hon. J. C. | Smith, Rt. Hon. F. E. (L'pool, Walton) |
| Grant, James Augustus | Mackinder, Halford J. | Smith, Harold (Warrington) |
| Greene, Walter Raymond | Macmaster, Donald | Spear, Sir John Ward |
| Gretton, John | M'Neill, Ronald (Kent, St. Augustine's) | Stanier, Beville |
| Guinness, Hon. Rupert (Essex, S. E.) | Magnus, Sir Philip | Stanley, Hon. G. F. (Preston) |
| Guinness, Hon. W. E. (Bury S. Edmunds) | Malcolm, Ian | Starkey, John Ralph |
| Gwynne, R. S. (Sussex, Eastbourne) | Mason, James F. (Windsor) | Staveley-Hill, Henry |
| Haddock, George Bahr | Meysey-Thompson, E. C. | Stewart, Gershom |
| Hall, Frederick (Dulwich) | Mills, Hon. Charles Thomas | Swift, Rigby |
| Hamilton, C. G. C. (Ches., Altrincham) | Moore, William | Talbot, Lord Edmund |
| Hamilton, Lord C. J. (Kensington, S.) | Morrison-Bell, Capt. E. F. (Ashburton) | Terrell, G. (Wilts, N.W.) |
| Hardy, Rt. Hon. Laurenco | Morrison-Bell, Major A. C. (Honiton) | Terrell, Henry (Gloucester) |
| Harris, Leverton (Worcester, East) | Mount, William Arthur | Thomas-Stanford, Charles |
| Harrison-Broadley, H. B. | Neville, Reginald J. N. | Tobin, Alfred Aspinall |
| Helmsley, Viscount | Newdegate, F. A. | Touche, George Alexander |
| Henderson, Major H. (Berks, Abingdon) | Newton, Harry Kottingham | Tryon, Captain George Clement |
| Henderson, Sir A. (St. Geo., Han. Sq.) | Nicholson, William G. (Petersfield) | Tullibardine, Marquess of |
| Herbert, Hon. A. (Somerset, S.) | Nield, Herbert | Valentia, Viscount |
| Hewins, William Albert Samuel | O'Neill, Hon. A. E. B. (Antrim, Mid) | Ward, A. S. (Herts, Watford) |
| Hibbert, Sir Henry F. | Orde-Powlett, Hon. W. G. A. | Warde, Colonel C. E. (Kent, Mid) |
| Hill-Wood, Samuel | Paget, Almeric Hugh | Watson, Hon. W. |
| Hohler, Gerald Fitzroy | Parker, Sir Gilbert (Gravesend) | Weigall, Captain A. G. |
| Hope, Harry (Bute) | Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington) | Willoughby, Major Hon. Claud |
| Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield) | Peel, Lieut.-Colonel R. F. | Wills, Sir Gilbert |
| Hope, Major J. A. (Midlothian) | Perkins, Walter F. | Wilson, A. Stanley (Yorks, E. R.) |
| Horne, Edgar | Peto, Basil Edward | Wilson, Captain Leslie O. (Reading) |
| Horner, Andrew Long | Pollock, Ernest Murray | Wood, Hon. E. F. L. (Yorks, Ripon) |
| Houston, Robert Paterson | Pretyman, Ernest George | Wood, John (Stalybridge) |
| Hunt, Rowland | Pryce-Jones, Colonel E. | Worthington Evans, L. |
| Hunter, Sir Charles Rodk. | Quitter, Sir Wiliam Eley C. | Yate, Colonel C. E. |
| Jardine, Ernest (Somerset, East) | Randies, Sir John S. | Younger, Sir George |
| Kerry, Earl of | Ratcliff, R. F. | |
| Keswick, Henry | Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel | TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr. |
| Kinloch-Cooke, Sir Clement | Ronaldshay, Earl of | Royds and Mr. Fitzroy. |
| Lane-Fox, G. R. | Rutherford, John (Lancs., Darwen) |
§ Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER then proceeded successively to put forthwith the Question on any Amendments moved by the Government, of which notice had been given.
§ Amendments made: In paragraph (a), after the word "where," insert the words "before or after the passing of this Act"; after the word "Duty" ["where Estate Duty or any"], insert the words "has been paid"; after the word "have" ["have been paid"], insert the words "either before or after the passing of this Act"; after the word "paid" ["have been paid"], insert the words "or are payable."
§ At the end of the Clause, add the words:
§ "and, in addition, a sum equal to simple interest on the said amount of Settlement Estate Duty calculated at the rate of three per cent. per annum from the fifteenth day of August, nineteen hundred and fourteen, up to the date of the occasion, shall be paid to the several 590 persons, or their representatives, who would have been entitled to the income arising from that amount, if that amount had on the fifteenth day of August, nineteen hundred and fourteen, been added to the capital of the settled property, and shall be divided amongst those persons, or their representatives, according to the several interests they would have had in that income."
§ After the words last inserted, add the words,
§ "and (c) Section eleven of The Finance Act, 1900, as amended by section fifty-nine of The Finance (1909–10) Act, 1910, shall not operate on any such surrender, assurance, divesting, or disposition as is mentioned in the said Section eleven made by any person between the fifteenth day of August, nineteen hundred and fourteen, and the first day of April, nineteen hundred and fifteen, so as to make any Estate Duty payable on the death of that person which would not have been payable but for this Section."—[Mr. Lloyd George.]
591| SECOND SCHEDULE. | |||
| Enactments Repealed. | |||
| Session and Chapter. | Short Title. | Statutes Repealed. | |
| 57 & 58 Vict. c. 30 | … | The Finance Act, 1894 | Sub-sections (1) and (4) of Section five; sub-section (4) of Section twenty-one. |
| 10 Edw. 7. c. 8. | .. | The Finance (1909–10) Act, 1910. | Section fifty-four and the Second Schedule as respects persons dying after the fifteenth day of August, one thousand nine hundred and fourteen; Section sixty-seven; in sub-section (1) of Section sixty-nine the words "not exceeding in the case of land "one-eighth and in the case of houses "one-twelfth part of the duty of an "amount equal to the annual value." |
| 1 Geo. 5. c. 2. | … | The Revenue Act, 1911 | Section eleven. |
§ Amendment made: After the word "five" ["Sub-sections (1) and (4) of Section five"], insert the words "in Section seventeen the words 'the rate of the Settlement Estate Duty where the property is settled shall be two per cent.'"—[Mr. Lloyd George.]
§ Bill to be read the third time to-morrow (Thursday) and to be printed. [Bill 340.]