HL Deb 11 November 1918 vol 31 cc1164-78

Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.

THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE (LORD CLINTON)

My Lords, this is a Bill for the purpose of amending the Tithes Acts which have been passed since the year 1836 up to almost the present time; and it amends them in three main ways. First of all, it departs from the ordinary custom of fixing the tithe varying on the price of grain, and fixes it at the figure at which it stands this year—namely, £109—for a period of seven years. Secondly, it proposes to do away with the septennial average upon which the price of tithe is fixed and substitute for it a fifteen years average. Thirdly, it provides a scheme to amend the Acts relating to the redemption of the tithe, and to make them more easily carried out.

There is some urgency in dealing with this matter, because, owing to the abnormal prices to which grain has risen consequent upon the war, the tithe is becoming a very serious burden—in some cases an almost intolerable burden—upon the tithe-payers. There is also considerable advantage in dealing with the matter now because, owing to the high rate of Government interest, it is possible to provide a scheme of redemption which will be better both for the tithe-owner and the tithe-payer. Your Lordships are no doubt familiar with most of the details surrounding the incidence of the tithe rent charge, but I should like to take up a few minutes of your time in placing the position shortly before the House.

In the year 1836, for very good reasons, the whole of the tithe then existing—in whatever class the tithe was—was valued and commuted at a rent charge, perpetual but varying year by year according to the average price of grain. The intention obviously of the authors of the Act was, by using the price of grain as a basis, to provide for the tithe-owner an income which would always have the same purchasing power in the chief necessities of life. The method that was adopted was to take £100 of tithe and divide it into three parts and ascertain what quantity of each sort of grain at the prices of the day would each equal one-third part of £100. The price of the day was for wheat 7s. 0¼d. per bushel, for barley 3s. 11½d., and for oats 2s. 9d. and the quantities fixed were ninety-five bushels of wheat, 168 bushels of barley, and 242 bushels of oats. Those fixed quantities have ever since the passing of that Act remained the multipliers which, used in connection with the price of the day—subject, of course, to the septennial average—have given us year by year the value of the tithe rent charge.

The septennial average was adopted in order, as far as possible, to prevent any sharp rise or fall in the value of the tithe rent charge which might follow a sudden rise or fall in the price of grain. But in spite of the septennial average the fluctuations have been very considerable. Starting at par in 1836 they rose to £112 in 1861 and reached the same figure in 1875. These are the highest prices to which tithe rose. They fell in the year 1901 to £66; consequently during those eighty odd years we have seen a fluctuation of £46 in the tithe rent charge. The average value of the tithe rent charge in the same period has been £91, and it might appear from that that the tithe owner had had very much the the worst of the bargain. I do not think that is strictly the case, because whether the tithe is high or low he has always received a sum of equal purchasing power to £100 in 1836—a sum which would, at the price of the day, purchase the same amount of grain as £100 would have purchased in that year.

But at the same time I have no doubt that the tithe-owner has been very severely hit in the time of low prices, chiefly perhaps because the price of grain is no longer such a good index of the value of money or the purchasing power of an income as at one time it may have been. There are many articles of necessity now that probably were luxuries eighty years ago. The general standard of living and comfort has risen for every one. Every man in receipt of wages or a salary has had additions made in order to enable him to keep up a necessary standard, and I think it is perfectly clear that the tithe-owner is fully entitled to tithe, to whatever extent it may rise, even though it were fixed on the abnormal prices due to the war. And there is absolutely nothing in the erroneous idea that because tithe has gone up in consequence of the war therefore the tithe owner is making a profit out of the war.

This being, as I submit, a correct view, Parliament would require to have some very strong reason before it can justly cut down the tithe owner's income, and it would require to be shown some reasonable inducement to the tithe owner for accepting such a reduction. Before I deal with that I think I will say one word on the position of the tithe payer. In the year 1891 the burden of the payment of tithe was placed on the landowner. I believe that the land owner had always been ultimately responsible for the payment of tithe, but by the ordinary contract of tenancy he had passed that burden on to the tenant, and there it had remained. But the Act of 1891 made him primarily as well as ultimately re- sponsible. Of recent years there has sprung up a class of owner—the owner occupier—which has increased enormously owning to the sales of estates; and he is in a position, occupying his farm, of taking advantage of the high price of grain. Numerically he is probably almost the larger class of tithe-payer, although in the aggregate, of course, the amount of tithe he pays is very much less. But having the advantage of the high price of grain, it should be presumed that he would there-force be easily able to pay the high price of tithe. And, other things being equal, undoubtedly it ought to be so.

But one must recognise, I think, the cost of production, and that has increased enormously during recent years. Rates and taxes and everything else going to the production of corn have gone up in price. Labour alone is 100 per cent. higher than before the war and probably 200 per cent. higher than at the time of the passing of the Act of 1836. And while there are in this cost of production many elements of permanency which I think are entirely absent from the present high range of prices, that is to say, while the cost of production will to a large extent keep somewhere near its present level, it is quite certain that the price of corn will fall. But the tithe-payer sees before him a largely increasing tithe. He can be certain, I think, that next year tithe will rise to £123. The following year we may be certain that it will rise to or about the figure of £136, and after that there will be a rapid rise the extent of which, of course, it is impossible accurately to judge. But he has before him this certain rise, which has to come out of the margin left between the high cost of production and the price of corn. The price of corn is certain to fall, but owing to the high prices at present existing the price of tithe, on the septennial average, would remain for a considerable period. And with the falling price of corn, and the sustained cost of production and the high rent charge, the position of the owner-occupier would be almost an impossible one.

The position of the non-occupying owner is in some respects worse. He gets no advantage at all from the existing high price of corn. He is as well as—perhaps more than—any one else burdened with the burdens of the war. And there is nothing by which he can increase his income to meet these additional charges. It has been suggested that he should raise his rents. I admit that in certain cases, in low-rented estates, it might be not only possible but fair to invite the tenants, as long as they can do so, to assist the owner in these heavy charges put upon his land, but I do not like to contemplate at all what might be the effect if there was a general attempt to raise rents all over the country for the purpose of paying a charge due to the Church. I think it would create a position which neither the tithe-owner nor the tithe-payer would like to see; and it seems that we are now in this position, that the tithe-owner has a perfect right to demand the full income which prices would give him, but the tithe-payer not perhaps next year or the year after, but at some time, will be in a position that he cannot pay. Consequently we have reached a deadlock which I think does require Parliament to come in and settle.

May I turn to the question, which I want to answer if I can, of what would really justify Parliament in stepping in, assisting the tithe-payer, and lowering the income of the clergy. I am speaking of the clergy as the tithe-owners because I am certain that Parliament will consider that any scheme which is fair to the clerical tithe-owner will be abundantly fair to the lay tithe-owner. I should like to call your Lordships' attention to what happened just before the passing of the Tithe Act, 1836. There were, as we know, serious troubles in connection with tithe, and a great deal of friction and ill-feeling. For certain reasons tithe was considered to be a charge upon production, and there was a sense of injustice among men who were improving their estates that on account of their outlay of capital they should have to pay larger charges. The method of collection, in so far as it remained collected in kind, was also another matter of constant friction, with the result that matters reached a danger point and there were actually tithe riots in many parts of the country. The clergy up to that time, to their credit, had done their best voluntarily to meet the state of affairs. I think one sees in the Debates that the tithe-owner was not in very many cases attempting to collect more than about 60 per cent. of the tithe due to him. He found that it was better to abate something of his just demand, to accept less than the fair income to which he was entitled, rather than rouse that friction and ill-feeling which did a great deal to undermine and destroy his personal in- fluence and personal friendships, which were necessary for the proper carrying out of his sacred duties.

That was the position then. I do not suggest for one moment that the same position has occurred or is likely to occur now, but there is just this resemblance—one sees it in the very general suggestion that the clergy are making a profit out of the war. It is absolutely wrong, but it does exist, and there is the danger, which I think is a present danger, that if tithe increased, as it would naturally increase, if it really became an unfair burden upon the owner or the occupier, then there would be the same sort of ill-feeling and friction which existed in the older time, and which we all believe would be very disadvantageous to the clergy themselves. I do not rely for one moment upon that as the chief reason for asking the clergy to abate their income. I think we find it very much more in the possibility of finding a stable scheme of tithe redemption. If we can carry through a redemption I think it must fulfil two principles. It must give the tithe-owner an income such as he has reasonable expectation of receiving, and at the same time it must be sufficiently attractive to the tithe-payer to induce him to redeem. If we can adopt such a scheme and if it is carried out, as we hope, fully, then I think we shall have done a very great deal to get rid of all those difficulties which surround the tithe question, and we shall have got past a great number of those controversies which it is far better to avoid than to discuss.

The existence of the present high rate of interest on Government loans makes it possible to reconcile the natural difference between the tithe payer and the tithe owner, and the proposals of the Government are laid down in the Second Schedule of this Act. I have endeavoured in placing the position before your Lordships to put as fairly as I can the relative position of the tithe owner and the tithe payer. I have endeavoured to draw a fair line between interests which are necessarily conflicting, and that is the spirit in which the Bill is drawn, and I am quite confident it is the spirit in which it will be discussed in this House.

My noble and learned friend Lord Parmoor has a measure before your Lordships dealing with the same question. We travel side by side on exactly the same road. The measures are drawn in the same spirit and we have the same aims in view, but we try to arrive at them by slightly different methods. The noble and, learned Lord restricts the price of tithe for a period which I think amounts to thirteen years—for the Corn Production Act and ten years thereafter. Our proposal is to restrict it for seven years; but we have in this scheme, in the first clause I think of the Bill, the substitution of a fifteen years average for a septennial average. That would have the effect undoubtedly of stabilising the price, and I think he will be satisfied that our two schemes combined are not very widely different from the one which he proposes. In the second clause we deal with the redemption of rent charges, and in that our method is different from the noble and learned Lord's. He proposes a flat rate of twenty years purchase for tithe, while we propose in the Second Schedule of the Bill a varying rate, our object being, of course, to fix a varying rate of years purchase, so that we can always get a capital sum of redemption money, which, at the particular price or rate of interest of Government loans for the day, will give an amount equal to the original income from the tithe. I think a flat rate would in many cases work unfairly. I presume that twenty years is taken at the present moment because the rate of Government loans is now about 5 per cent.

LORD PARMOOR

Hear, hear.

LORD CLINTON

While it is applicable as long as the rate remains at 5 per cent. it evidently becomes quite inapplicable when the rate rises high above, or falls much below, that figure. Obviously, the income which the capital sum for redemption at twenty years purchase would produce at 3 per cent. is very much less than it would produce if the interest on Government loans remains at 5 per cent. These are the reasons why I think a flat rate is inapplicable for any long period of time, and I hope the noble and learned Lord will agree that a varying rate is more suitable to our purpose. I do not think I need trouble your Lordships with any more remarks upon these clauses. They are intended to carry out the main principles of the Bill, and if there is anything in them they can be dealt with in Committee. I beg to move.

Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Clinton.)

THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY

My Lords, though the hour is not favourable for dealing with the subject at length, I should like to say a few words upon the Bill the Second Reading of which has just been moved by the noble Lord. His speech was one of singular lucidity, and I believe it will ultimately be referred to as one of the most lucid and effective statements ever made upon a subject which is certainly complicated to those who have only studied it a little, and complicated even to those who, for one reason or another, have had to study it a great deal.

That some Bill was at this moment practically necessary I am myself persuaded. I note what the noble Lord has said as to the reasons why the Bill was introduced and as to the obvious objections to the introduction of a Bill which might seem to betoken that its introducers held the opinion—which he has so decidedly repudiated—that the tithe owner had been, to use a vulgar phrase, in some way profiteering during the present war. The noble Lord has made perfectly clear that there is no accusation (if I could call it so) of that kind against the tithe-owner, and it would be exceedingly hard on the clergy if anything of the kind were to be alleged by those really competent to make a statement on the subject.

But none the less there is in the popular mind at this moment a feeling on the subject which it is very desirable to meet and allay if we possibly can without unfairness either to the tithe-payer or the tithe-owner. So far as I am able to judge the Bill, though it could not be shown, I think, to be logically necessary, can be shown to be practically necessary owing to what has now happened. The Bill, as drawn, makes every endeavour to be studiously fair both to the tithe payer and the tithe-owner. Whether it is so is a matter upon which judgment may very well be formed in your Lordships' House when the Bill is considered in Committee, because the House contains very many noble Lords to whom the subject is familiar and who are exceptionally competent to form a judgment on the subject.

It must always be remembered that while in all these discussions we speak of the clergy as tithe-owners, it is not the clergy only who own tithes. There are not only private individuals but corporations, too, who own tithes which are not clerical in any strict sense at all, and the question has to be dealt with from quite another point of view than that of a mere question between the incumbent and his tithe-paying parishioners. But the question is one which has got to be dealt with at this moment, and I believe, as I have said, that the way in which this Bill attempts to deal with it is on the whole the right way.

First, it tries to steady or stabilize, to use the noble Lord's word, the fluctuations which have been so visible both during these latest years and, in the opposite direction, a good many years ago—fluctuations which are quite singularly undesirable in the case of those whose income is affected by a very small change, upwards or downwards. The income, being a small one, ought to be at least settled so that the man with so small an income should know what he has reasonably a right to expect. I imagine no single tithe-owner expected ten years ago that it was in the least likely the rise would take place which has since occurred, and certainly twenty-five years ago most people did not expect anything like the fall which subsequently took place.

When fluctuation causes the greatest possible harm as regards the income of a man whose total income is, say, £250 or £300 a year, and when a man gets £68 instead of his £100, it is obviously a matter of the most serious import to people so circumstanced. This Bill will prevent these rapid and most disturbing fluctuations by substituting for the seven years average a fifteen years average. The fifteen years average will be a far more steadying thing and will prevent changes coming as rapidly as they did. Then, on the other point which the noble Lord made, the provision for making redemption easier is a provision which is singularly opportune at the present time. We can just now make it desirable both for the tithe-payer and the tithe-owner to redeem, and I venture to hope that the immediate result of this Bill will, on a very large scale indeed, mean the redemption of the tithe at present paid.

From the point of view of the life of the Church, and from other points of view as well, it is a desirable thing, I am certain, that such redemption should take place, and the fact that this Bill facilitates it in the way it does is one of the characteristics which commend it strongly to myself. In arranging for such redemption we have to take care that the incumbent does not, in his anxiety to make an arrangement which will relieve him from present difficulties, do something which would be of permanent loss and detriment to the money of which he is only a trustee. This is done by the provisions which are made in this Bill. In the Schedule care is taken to show that those with whom the ultimate judgment has to rest as to whether or not the redemption is to be allowed, are bound to take into consideration the quite considerable series of points to which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Parmoor, called attention a few weeks ago.

For all these reasons I regard the Bill as on the whole a right and wise one. That it will be so regarded by tithe-owners all through the country we dare not hope. The clergy are most naturally feeling at this moment in many places a sense of disappointment that, whereas for years the holder of a particular benefice had received some £70 or even less in lieu of £100, now, when owing to circumstances the tithe has gone up, the Legislature steps in to say that he is not to have the corresponding advantage; that is an obvious feeling, and we have the greatest sympathy with it, but I do believe that when the matter is considered properly and the long term of years is regarded which lies ahead, and when the whole conditions are carefully weighed, as they have been weighed both in Convocation and elsewhere by some of the most thoughtful of the clergy, it will be found to be an advantage to the owners of tithe and to the payers and to provide the possibility of immediate arrangement. Therefore I can cordially ask your Lordships to give a Second Reading to the Bill which Lord Clinton has introduced, and say I believe it to be wisely and well drawn on the whole, though possibly there may be details which may have to be considered in Committee. And I believe your Lordships, by passing such a Bill through the House, will be conferring that benefit on both the parties for whom it is intended.

LORD PARMOOR

My Lords, I heartily support the Bill which has been introduced by the noble Lord opposite. There are two things to be considered as regards a Tithe Redemption Bill—first, the sum which you ought to capitalise; secondly, the method of capitalisation. When I introduced my Bill, I proposed that the sum to be capitalised should be based upon the gross tithe. In the Bill before your Lordships it is upon the net tithe. But the net tithe is taken at £109, where the gross tithe which I took was £100, the old par value. Anf if you take the land tax and rates and the cost of collection, in the great majority of cases there will be the same original base figure on which the calculation is to be made. In other words, tithe from £100 to £109 will come to about the same figure as in my Bill. It will not be the same in all cases, but on the average it will be about the same.

The other factor is the number of years purchase. For the next two years it is stated at twenty-one years, which I think is quite a proper figure. After that the number of years purchase is to be calculated, so that a permanent unit equal to the gross annual value after deducting from that value the average amount paid, and so on, is to be the sum for compensation. That is to say, you are to capitalise the net tithe on such a basis that you guarantee, as far as you can, to the tithe-owner the same income that he is then receiving. And that is, of course, a perfectly just provision.

But there is one matter to which I would call the attention of the noble Lord opposite The transaction is to be carried out practically through the agency, or with the approval, of Queen Anne's Bounty. Also I understand that the funds of redemption are to be paid into Queen Anne's Bounty. What I wish to ask the noble Lord is, Could not he have substituted for Queen Anne's Bounty the Ecclesiastical Commissioners? I know that at the present time Queen Anne's Bounty deals with tithe redemption, but it is only £70,000 in the aggregate which has been spent in tithe. But when you are dealing with glebe lands you go to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. The importance, from the clerical tithe-owner's point of view, is this. If you go to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, which is a stronger financial body, you might have a guarantee not only that the annuity originally purchased should be the equivalent of the income which the tithe-owner was receiving, but that that annuity should not be diminished in the future. If you go to Queen Anne's Bounty you pay, as the noble Lord appreciates, the sum into the general Queen Anne's Bounty Fund, and it may be, in fact might almost inevitably be, that the rate of interest would generally diminish, and the annuities which you provide for the tithe-owner would also diminish to a corresponding extent. That is a hard matter. You should not only give him the annuity at the time, but ensure that the annuity is not altered in the future, so that he may know what the expectation of his future income may be. I think this could be carried out if it were done through the agency of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, who have surplus funds for making good any loss which might arise from the operation of a change in the value of money. I only make that suggestion. In other respects I think the Bill is an admirable one, which will carry out the purposes to which the noble Lord has referred, and I hope it will be passed into law at the earliest possible moment.

THE LORD BISHOP OF NORWICH

My Lords, rather earlier in this session I addressed your Lordships' House on the whole question of tithe, and I hope I may be allowed to say to-day how cordially I welcome the fact that the Government have introduced this Bill to facilitate the redemption of tithe. For, as I said at that time—and I hope we are all agreed—that procedure certainly seems to offer the most favourable means of dealing with what I am sure is a rather difficult problem. I am thankful to know that this problem has now been removed from the hands of the amateur, for earlier in the year it is undoubtedly the case that some of the clerical tithe-owners—and I only speak of them—were moved to make some rather quixotic proposals in a generous way, giving the extra tithe that they were receiving to the Red Cross, or something of the kind. They who could afford to do that sort of thing were a little hard on their clerical brethren who could not afford to do so, and I am very glad to know that such action as that is likely to be put a stop to by the Bill, and that the whole question has been grappled with by the Government.

Whenever we speak to the clergy on the subject of tithe, the first question that comes forward is the question of rates. The clergy say they are the only class in the community who pay rates—they should say half rates—on their income. The truth is, no doubt, that as a matter of fact and of history this is a rather rough-and-ready way of expressing the grievance. But some of them do certainly feel it very strongly that they should be rated to any extent on agriculture. This Bill does not attempt to deal with the very thorny subject of rates, and if there is any question of revision of rates on tithe or on agritural property, of course the whole thing would have to be dealt with in a comprehensive manner.

But there is one particular point with regard to rates which I venture to bring forward to-day, and on which I desire to ask whether there is a possibility of the Government accepting any Amendment to the Bill. We cannot say that the word "rate" never occurs in the Bill—because in the Second Schedule the rates of which the tithe-owner is to be relieved are to be considered in determining the price that he should receive by way of redemption. I am not, therefore, entirely introducing the question of rates, because, as I say, it does occur in one place in the Bill. The point that I have in my mind is this. I consider it very unfortunate that at the present time assessment committees are far more inclined to raise the rates on tithe than on land. No doubt in part this comes about because tithe goes up and the assessment committees are aware of it, and can easily re-assess it. In the case of land it is naturally much more difficult to deal with the issue. The rates might fairly be based on the hypothetical rent which a tenant would be prepared to give. I think that it is very probable that the assessment committees are shelving the question of reassessment, although they do not postpone the re-assessment of tithe rent-charge. I have heard of a parish where the tithe-owner pays one quarter of the total of the rates on the agricultural land subject to tithe when he is supposed to receive a tenth of the produce.

I believe that the fallacy to which the noble Lord alluded that rents cannot be raised at the present time, is rather widespread, and that that may account for some of the confusion. It is forgotten that an operation one way or the other dependent upon the establishment of a minimum price of corn by the nature of the case cannot rise when the price of corn is above such minimum, but I would like to make this inquiry if I may of the Government—whether it would be possible to introduce a clause into the Bill touching the question of rates to this effect, that tithe rent-charge should not be more than a certain percentage of the rates. What, of course, is needed is that some authoritative pressure should be exercised upon assessment committees. That appears to be rather a difficult thing to bring about, though I suppose there must be some remedy if one knew how to exercise it. Meantime such a clause might set assessment committees thinking, and give them a rather useful lead in a matter which I think is very legitimate ground of dissatisfaction with the clergy. I am not, my Lords, raising the whole question of rates, but only this one fact, that the clergy appear to me at the present time to be paying, even accepting things as they are, a disproportionate and an unfair amount of the rates that arise from agricultural land liable to tithe.

LORD CLINTON

My Lords, in reference to the right rev. Prelate's remarks, historically I do not want to go far back. I have no doubt that there is a distinct liability upon the tithe to pay rates owing to the fact that the tithe-owner is not a mortgagee. He is an owner and occupier in so far as the produce belongs to him, and I have no doubt on that account that he is liable to the rate. The special point is that he shall not pay more than a certain proportion. He pays a rate upon his ascertained tithe for the year. It has nothing to do with the proportion upon the rest of the agricultural land. If his tithe is raised then his proportion undoubtedly is raised; but it is because he has a larger tithe that he pays a larger rate—at least, that is how I understand the matter. I do not think that I can promise to put in an Amendment to the Bill, but if the right rev. Prelate would like to put one down I should be very glad to consider it.

On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.