§ Lord Portmanlaid on the Table a Bill for giving compensation to tenants in England for improvements effected by them in certain cases. He considered that it was necessary to make provision that tenants should be compensated for improvements effected by them on estates of minors, or estates held of ecclesiastical corporations, or on estates managed by the Court of Chancery; for in all these 390 cases the party who expended the money had no security for due compensation. Steps should also be taken to counteract the evil consequences on leases for lives, of which remarkable examples were to be met with in all parts of the country. Their Lordships were not unaware of the difficulties which the Committee, which had sat during the last Session of Parliament to inquire into the subject, had experienced; and he must express his conviction of the almost impossibility of finding a remedy to meet the various evils connected with the question. He thought, however, that the best mode to be adopted was by means of agreements entered into by landlords and tenants, which should be equally binding on the heir of the parties and the purchaser of the land. One of the evils of the present system was the gradual expiration of leases for life, as it prevented the improvement of the estate. Leases for life held under private individuals and under the Ecclesiastical Commissioners were subject to similar evils; for in most instances the tenant who made improvements had no security that he or his family would reap the advantage. The chance of compensation ought not to be dependent upon the honour of a landlord or the character of his family; but a tenant ought to have a legal certainty, that if he spent money upon another man's property he should have a distinct return for it; and the only two methods of securing that were by well-arranged leases and the law. He felt considerable difficulty in addressing their Lordships after the statement of his noble Friend (Lord Stanley) on Monday evening. There was this great difference between his (Lord Portman's) Bill and that of his noble Friend—that whereas the Bill he now presented to their Lordships contained only four clauses, that proposed by his noble Friend contained a much greater number. Their Lordships, it would be recollected, had assented to the principle of the Bill of his noble Friend, and agreed to refer it to a Select Committee; but in Committee he was convinced it would not be found practicable to proceed with the Bill, as in providing for the evils it was intended to remedy, it would inevitably produce others of still greater magnitude. He felt that the great evil to be remedied was, that at present there was no law which gave to the tenant who improved the property of his landlord any security 391 for the due remuneration for the labour and capital expended. Every man under such circumstances ought to have not only a moral but a legal certainty, that if he spent money in improving another man's land, he would have an adequate return. The only way to effect this was, by a well-arranged system of leases, or by the enactment of the Legislature. But in default of an especial arrangement between the parties, which was merely optional, and could be defeated by the refusal of the interested party, the landlord, it was necessary to give the tenant an independent legal security by the Act of the Legislature. The plan he proposed was this—that it should be enacted that it should be lawful for any tenant of any land holding the same from a landlord, with or without lease of any kind, within six months prior to the expiration of his lease, or prior to quitting the land from notice of the landlord, to claim compensation, not exceeding the amount of three years' rent on the whole, for tillages and for permanent improvements, whereof he had not had the benefit and enjoyment for such a number of complete years as the contract between the parties or the custom of the country might have fixed, deducting from such claim the value of the enjoyment thereof that he might have had in each year after the completion of such work, unless such work had been done in pursuance of any regulation in the leases; to extend to such improvements only as permanently increased the value of the land, as the tenant might have made, or should have been made by contracts signed by each party, and after the term of the tenancy had commenced. He meant by that to distinguish between an original bargain made between a landlord and tenant, and any bargain which circumstances enabled them to make during the term of the tenancy. He further proposed that a landlord should have the right to claim within six months compensation for any damage done to the land by neglect, or by undue cropping thereof. So that each party would reciprocate in the benefit, if benefit it was, of the proposed plan; and that if, in the course of such arrangement, as to such works, for compensation to the landlord, for injury done to his land, or to the tenant, any dispute should arise, the same should be determined, upon forwarding the terms of the contract or the custom of the country to two arbitrators, 392 one to be appointed by the landlord, and the other by the tenant; and in the event of any failure, the matter should be referred to petty sessions, so as to ensure the arbitration being carried out, and the amount of the award be either added to or deducted from the rent, as the case might be, and the performance of it enforced in one of Her Majesty's superior courts of record. It would have been most desirable, instead of making use of the expressions "custom of the country," to have endeavoured in the schedule of the Bill to state to what remuneration should be given; but he found it impossible to frame any schedule to meet the case, and as there were existing customs in the country that were recognised and had the force of law, there would be no difficulty in the arbitrator carrying out the customs of the country in which the land was situated. The Bill of Lord Brougham to simplify leases would carry out the object which he (Lord Portman) had in view.
§ After a few words from Lord Beaumont,
§ Bill read 1a.
§ House adjourned.