CHURCH OF SCOTLAND (PROPERTY AND ENDOWMENTS) BILL. [H.L.]

HL Deb 01 April 1924 vol 57 cc3-41

Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.

VISCOUNT NOVAR

My Lords, before the Lord Chancellor moves the Second Reading of this Bill, may I ask him whether he will inform the House what bearing, if any, the contents of the Command Paper which has been circulated are intended to have on your Lordships' decision with regard to the Second Reading of the Bill?

THE LORD CHANCELLOR (VISCOUNT HALDANE)

If the noble Viscount will wait a little for what I have to say he will find that what is in the White Paper is of no value for to-day's debate, but is intended for a subsequent stage. I beg now to move the Second Reading of this Bill. It is a Bill which has been inherited from the late Government, and it was brought in by my noble friend Lord Novar, when he was Secretary of State for Scotland. The Bill is one to the principle of which the present Government give the fullest assent. If I were a private member I should have no hesitation in voting for this Bill, because it has behind it a great volume of opinion in Scotland. It is a Bill the principle of which it is difficult to refuse, and therefore I am in entire agreement with my noble friend on the broad principle of his Bill. It was founded on the Report of a Committee which sat in Scotland, and with which I was connected, but in certain points, not affecting the broad principle but going into details, the Bill departs from the recommendation of that Committee.

In order to make more readily intelligible to your Lordships the points of departure of this Bill from the last I have taken the somewhat unusual course of indicating them in a White Paper, but that does not mean that I feel myself in a position to put down Amendments for the Committee stage at once. The reason for putting the points down on the Command Paper is simply that they may receive consideration from those concerned with the Bill, especially in Scotland, where the Assemblies of the two Churches will shortly meet. Their committees are at present sitting. There is an important committee representing the Scottish landowners. On a former occasion agreement was reached between the Scottish landowners and the Churches on the scheme of the Bill. It is to be hoped that on the present occasion some sort of agreement will be reached in the same way; but, whatever the event, it is the public opinion in Scotland, and the public opinion in Scotland alone, which can decide on the merits of the subordinate controversy which arose over these points.

What they are I will explain a little later in popular language and in a general form so that your Lordships will not be at the trouble of comparing that White Paper with the Bill, at any rate at this stage. It will be therefore understood that the Committee stage cannot be taken at once. The Committee stage cannot be taken until the Assemblies and the committee of landowners have pronounced upon the question. When we get information as to their view we shall be, for the first time, in a position to judge in what form tht Amendments in Committee should be presented. Having said so much, it is quite clear, I think, that the White Paper does not affect the debate, and is merely there for the assistance of your Lordships in obtaining information.

I will proceed to the pith and substance of the Bill. As to that I am entirely at one, speaking for the Government, in supporting the broad principle of the Bill as brought in by my noble friend. It was only in those points of detail to which I referred that possible differences might arise. In order to make plain what is the meaning of the Hill it is necessary to describe the situation out of which it arose. In a few sentences I will remind those of your Lordships who are not familiar with it of the history out of which that situation came. In the year 1843 there took place what is called the disruption in the Church of Scotland. A large and important body of ministers and congregations left the Established Church under the leadership of Dr. Chalmers. The point on which they differed was not the principle of the national recognition of religion: in other words, not the general principle of establishment. Nor was it any point of fundamental doctrine. Both adhered to the confession of faith as set out in the Westminster Confession. The difference arose over another thing—the principle of what was called non-intrusion. In those days the civil courts successfully asserted their title to interfere in the internal affairs of the Church and to control it in matters of administration, matters of discipline and freedom of appointment. That principle, which was called the principle of non-intrusion, made the Free Church of those days split off from the Established Church, and a very important Church it became.

Matters went on for a little, when there arose yet another movement. In 1847 the United Presbyterian Church was constituted. It consisted originally of various bodies which had seceded from the Established Church and had come together and collected property in the course of time. At the outset the United Presbyterian Church and the Free Church were separated by the abstract principle of establishment. The Free Church contended only that the State ought not to intrude into spiritual matters, while the United Presbyterian Church contended that there should be no connection between Church and State at all. As time went on the two Churches came nearer and nearer together. In the year 1900 they united. But that was the beginning of strife, because a minority of the old Free Church contested the right of the Free Church, as it stood, to enter into this union with the United Presbyterian Church. They carried the case to the Law Courts. They claimed that the Free Church was the only body which held to the trust deeds as they originally stood, and they claimed the right to take the property, and so on, away from the majority of the United Free Church.

The Scottish Courts threw that claim out; but on appeal to your Lordships' House, your Lordships held that the minority of the Free Church were entitled to the great bulk of the property. The decision of this House was given in the year 1904, and Mr. Balfour's Government immediately took the matter up and after consideration passed an Act which set up the statutory Commission to deal with this vast mass of property, and to administer it. It was far too much for the remainder of the original Free Church to handle and consequently the Commission was instructed, after making ample provision for the new and more limited body which claimed to be the Free Church, to make over the rest for the benefit of the new United Free Church body which had entered into union with the United Presbyterian Church in the year 1900. That was done.

We have, no concern, to-day, with the old Free Church. What we are concerned with is the United Free Church which has vast endowments collected by itself and which it claims to use with complete spiritual freedom. A very remarkable development followed. The Established Church of Scotland asked that a clause might be inserted in the Act of 1905 giving the Established Church greater freedom as regards its formularies. The result of that was that the two Churches—the United Free Church and the Established Church—began to negotiate, and presently they found they were very near to each other. The Established Church, too, began to insist on the principle of non-intrusion, and to claim for itself complete spiritual freedom in the administration of its affairs and in dealing with its formularies. As a result the two Churches agreed, after a short time, to Articles of Union. But there were certain things which restrained the Established Church from entering into union with a body which insisted so strongly on the principle of spiritual liberty. So, in 1921, the Coalition Government passed an Act which gave to the Established Church of Scotland the most complete, freedom in spiritual affairs; a freedom as great as the Free Church had ever claimed in the days of Dr. Chalmers and as great as that Free Church anywhere possessed after the passing of the Act of 1905.

That Act passed, and, as I say, it gave both Churches complete spiritual freedom so that they were able to enter into union. But there was an obstacle, and an obstacle which was recognised by those concerned. It was this. The property of the Established Church consisted of lands which belonged to that Church but were regulated by Statute, and there was power in the Courts to control them in such a way that complete liberty for the Established Church could not be exercised unless an Act was passed which liberated the assets of that Church and gave her the same freedom as the Free Church had to enter into union. That situation was a very; complicated one for reasons which will presently appear. The interests of the Church of Scotland were interests in land, as I said, of a very technical character. The result was that a Conservative Government of the day resolved to make a systematic inquiry into what the property of the Established Church in Scot-land consisted of and how it could best be turned into a liquid form so that union might become possible. The desire for that in Scotland was intense.

I will give your Lordships the broad reasons for voting for the Second Reading of a Bill which, from the point of view of a great majority in Scotland, is looked on as a Bill which does the least compatible with justice. I am now speaking of the Bill introduced by Lord Novar, and which is taken over by the present Government. There are two reasons why that legislation is essential. The first is this. When there were three Churches—the Free Church, the United Presbyterian Church and the Established Church—they entered into competition, and they put down churches quite close to one another. Your Lordships will have seen in many parts of Scotland two or three, churches quite near to each other. The result of that was an over-plantation of kirks, to use the technical term, in the Highlands. The population of the Highlands was going down, and they are now no longer able to fill so many churches there. On the other hand, the tendency of population has been to centre round the great industrial places such as Glasgow, and the consequence is that, because of the diffusion of churches in unnecessary places, the resources of the Churches do not admit of provision being made for the populations in the populous centres.

It has been recognised generally throughout Scotland that there is only one way to get free from this difficulty, and that is to unite the Churches into a single body, which can administer its affairs as a whole, which can look at the interests of Scotland as a whole, plant the churches just where they are most wanted, and take them away from the places where they are not wanted. That is the first reason for the Bill. It is a very great and grave reason, and one which I think will commend itself to your Lordships.

There is a second reason which affects not more the churches than the owners of land in Scotland. The system of Church rights in the land in Scotland is a system of vast technicalities which is not comparable to any that we have in England, I know the tithe system of England and I know the teind system in Scotland, and I should say that the system in Scotland is much more technical than the tithe system in England. There is a general desire on the part of many-people to see the law simplified so as to make conveyancing much more cheap and easy. Another reason why this Bill should be supported is that, if passed, it would have that effect. It would also put the, assets of the Established Church into a liquid condition, and it would free the owners of land in Scotland from a heavy expense that they have under conditions as they prevail to-day because of the extraordinarily technical character of the system which has descended from generation to generation.

Those are the two broad reasons for the Bill, and the general reason which lies at the back of them is that there is a very strong desire on the part of the vast majority of people in Scotland to get this question settled. That is why there has been so much agitation, and so much expectation as to what Parliament would do.

I am afraid I must—and I will do it as briefly as possible—tell your Lordships what this teind system is. In the United Kingdom, as is well known, land is subject to tithes. Those tithes belong to the Church by a title just as clean, and just as binding, as the title of the owner of the land. In fact, in England, the title to the land was divided into two parts, one part being the title of the tithe owner to his tithe, and the other of the landowner to his land. They were two completely separate rights. The landowner had no right to interfere with the tithe owner, and the tithe owner had no right to interfere with the landowner beyond anything which the law recognised. In Scotland there was something analogous. There these rights were not called tithe rights, but teind rights.

As time went on the teind became a property wholly distinguished from that of the landowner. There is an idea among landowners that this Bill proposes to rate many of them for churches in which they take no interest whatever. There could not be a more complete delusion. The teinds are the property of the owners of the teinds, and the land is the property of the owners of the land, and the owners of the land only own their property subject to the absolute right of the teind-holder to hold his property with just as good a title, and just as clearly as the landowner owns his property. In course of time the teinds got into private hands. Sometimes they were bought by the landowners, who thus became owners of the teinds. Sometimes the Crown acquired them. But, whoever acquired them, the teinds, in all cases, have become the property of persons who represent various classes, and who are distinguished from the landowners unless the latter happen to have bought the teinds.

Then there was something which was inherent and paramount to all those rights, and which could not be got rid of, and that was the law of the land, which said that the stipend of the minister of the parish was a charge upon the teind. If there were any teinds unexhausted and available for the purpose, the stipend was to be the first charge upon them. It was a charge on the fruits of the land, and it was, therefore, a charge paramount and preferable even to the title of the landlord himself. There are 880 parishes in Scotland where the minister is supported by the teind, and the stipend comes out of the rent in the way I have indicated. The minister has an absolute right to it.

Of what does the stipend consist? It consists of an annuity, if it may be so called, of a varying character—varying because it depends upon the price of grain in each year. In each year the sheriff of the county settles the stipend of the minister by fixing the price of grain, and the stipend varies according to the price of grain in each year. Nominally, the stipend is paid in grain, but really it is paid in the value of grain. The stipend consists of so many chalders of grain. A chalder of grain means about a ton of grain, and its value is fixed by the sheriff for the year. The minister whose stipend is paid in chalders is paid in the value of the chalder of grain as so ascertained each year. Therefore, the minister's stipend varies very much. But that is not the worst. The stipend, as I have said, consists of a right to the fruits of the land, and its payment is distributed over the heritors of the parish. The heritors may be very numerous in a parish. I know parishes where the heritors number more than two-thirds of the householders, and your Lordships may well imagine the task of a minister if he has to collect his stipend from two thousand or more persons, some of whom will not be willing to pay him what is due from them.

The result is that the situation has become a very bad one, and in the end an agreement was arrived at, the basis of which was that the ministers were willing to take less than their stipends, provided they could get them fully secured. But the bargain was that there must be perfect security. It was to be a security upon which they could absolutely depend, and on that footing, and that footing alone, the ministers were willing to take less, because, on the whole, they thought they would be better off with that arrangement. The Government which was in office before the late Government appointed a Committee to consider the question. I had the honour to be Chairman of that Committee. It was considered that it should be presided over by somebody with judicial experience; but all my colleagues were very familiar with the subject.

We sat for a year and took evidence of ministers, landowners, and all sorts of people. We worked out a report, and the substance of our Report was that the teinds should be converted into securities in this way. The stipend was to be ascertained, but instead of it being ascertained in such a fashion that it varied from year to year according to the price of grain, it was to be settled once and for all by taking an average. There was some discussion as to what the average should be, but we finally settled on such a time as should extend over the war period, and by taking a longer time we equalised the period. During the war the price of grain went up very much; before the war it was often very low. By taking an average over fifty years we found that we could get an amount which the parties were willing to accept. It worked out, roughly, in this way. The value of the chalder, taking an average of thirty years, is £17 5s The value of the chalder to-day, taken according to the price of grain, is £20 12s. 10d. Your Lordships will see that the average we proposed gave a smaller stipend to the minister than he would have had under the present system; but he had this advantage, that if he could get complete security then he was in a position to know what his income would be.

This is the way the Committee worked it out. It was proposed to set up a Board of Trustees and to give every landowner the opportunity to redeem the stipend on a certain footing; and the footing we proposed was that it should be so much invested in Consols as would produce the average and give perfect security for the stipend. It would have been hard on landowners if they had been called upon to place a large sum in Consols in order to provide for the teind and stipend, and we said, let the landowner go on paying the average value of the stipend on the lower fixed rate of which I have spoken, and let him also pay one-tenth of the annual amount of the stipend, but let that one-tenth be accumulated in the hands of the trustees of the Church until an amount is reached which will purchase sufficient Government. Consols to give security for the stipend. That would be an advantage. We could not tell whether the price of securities would go up or down. If you try to calculate at the beginning what the price of securities will be in the future you are obviously exposing ministers to great risks. The Church may not have enough to pay, and the price of investments may go up.

The plan, as I have explained, simply amounts to this—to accumulate gradually, by tenths of the smaller stipend, such sum as would amount in the end to the amount of Consols required to give absolute security to the minister for the smaller stipend he was willing to accept because of the certainty and knowledge he would have of receiving the amount of his stipend. That is the principle of the Bill, but when it came to be incorporated into the measure there was a departure in one or two material points from the proposition as laid down. First of all, instead of saying that the substance of the reduced stipend should be the national security of Consols, it said, let it be twenty-two years' purchase. It was not clear that twenty-two years' purchase would provide for the stipend as it became payable, because this Bill could not come into operation at once. Like every Bill which deals with Church property it had to take account of the vested interests of ministers by leaving them for their lives, or during their tenure of the benefices, in possession of what they had had before.

It was not our plan to take anything away, but as these livings became vacant, as the minister ceased, by death or otherwise, to be entitled to the stipend, we proposed that the change should come in, that "standardisation," to quote the term used in the Bill, should become operative; that the system under which the smaller stipends became payable, with Consols as the security, should operate. The investments could not be estimated on any fixed scale, as the Bill, at the beginning or even later on, had to provide for these stipends falling in and standardisation being gradual. The Bill does not lay down the amount of Consols that should be provided, but proposes twenty-two years' purchase, and, for the reason I have given, it was not clear to us that twenty-two years' purchase would be sufficient to provide adequate security. I know there are many people who say you can buy ground rents at twenty-two years' purchase.

SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS

Seventeen years.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

There may be some feu duties that may be bought at seventeen years' purchase, but they are the feu duties which give rise to a great deal of anxiety. I suspect that a fifteen year feu duty is one which gives rise to a good deal of concern. But nobody can tell what the price of feu duties is going to be in future. Nobody can tell whether Church trustees would be able to make investments which would meet the difficulty of the change of circumstances, and, accordingly, there has been a great deal of controversy in Scotland. There is another provision over which a good deal of controversy has arisen. My noble friend proposes that the scheme of the, Committee should only apply when the stipend is of a smaller amount than, I think he said, £1. The result of that would be that as the unfortunate trustees of the Church, being trustees, have no discretion in the matter, the Church would find itself involved in a series of disagreeable litigations with the heritors. Great exception was naturally taken to that. I am not mentioning these facts as reasons for resisting the Second Heading of the Bill. On the contrary, I am prepared at present to take them as they stand, for I naturally want to see what the considered state of public opinion will be when attention has been drawn to them, and it is for that reason that the White Paper has been issued.

There is one other point to which I must draw attention. In Scotland, if a minister wants his church put in order or even rebuilt, if he wants his manse repaired, if he wants his glebe looked to, he has the right to go to the heritors, and the heritors are, by law, subject to the burden of doing all these things. We took the view that it would be a very good thing if we could get rid altogether of this necessity, which involves irritating demands on the heritors. The Committee's Report and this Bill both propose this reform, to the advantage especially of large landowners. But not of these alone. If you own land in Scotland you do not know what you may be called upon to pay, and recently there was in Glasgow a very serious case called the Cathcart case in which a minister asked for a new church costing a large sum. The result of the existing law was that many people belonging to other denominations were called upon to pay. There was almost a riot in Glasgow on that occasion. The Report of the Committee proposed to put an end to that sort of thing, and it was said that the heritors must put the manse or the church in a state of tenantable repair before the new system came in. That is obviously right, because unless it is in that condition you cannot apply the new system to it. Under the new method, if it is put in a condition fit for occupation, you are able to make a new start in which the heritors will be in a much more favourable condition than they are at present. What that means to the landowners of Scotland is that they will obtain relief from a serious liability.

I have told your Lordships what the substance of this Bill is and what it is that lies at the root of the situation. I am somewhat surprised to see an Amendment put down in the name of the noble Duke, the Duke of Buccleuch, for the rejection of the Bill, and, indeed, of the very principle of the Bill. Whatever he the result of the discussions of these points of which I have spoken—and the Government have come to no decision as to the, form in which the Bill should ultimately pass, whether it should be as the noble Viscount, the author of the Bill, proposes or whether it should be amended in some such manner as I have suggested—whichever course is taken, the Motion of the noble Duke rejects the great principle of the Bill that the Churches should be allowed to unite their resources. The Amendment also means the rejection of the proposal that the present conditions of Scottish land tenure should be altered and made smoother than they are at present. No body of opinion is comparable to the immense volume of opinion which is in favour of the general principle of this Bill. It is, to me, difficult to conceive how any one who is so genuinely Scottish as the noble Duke, and in such close intercourse with his people and in contact with their views, should propose to reject the Bill.

The Church of Scotland has an absolute right to this property, as the noble Duke knows very well from experience of his own estate. There is no limitation of the title to that right if the Church enters into litigation. I have shown your Lordships that under this Bill, if it comes back to Parliament, the landlord will pay less than he pays to-day on the basis of £17 5,s. as against £20 12s. 10d., which he pays at the present time. He will have to pay a little more in the shape of a sinking fund increment, only a tenth of the stipend annual rent charges. This amounts merely to about £l 14s. 2d. Consequently, he will pay a total of £18 19s., as against £20 12s. 10d., with the certainty and assurance that at the end of a period of fifty years—it may be a little more or a little less—his land will be totally free from this burden of stipend, and its title simplified, and the minister will be secured by the national assurance given.

If the late Lord Balfour of Burleigh, who took a large part in the negotiations for this measure, could have been present to-day, we should have listened to one who would have given us Church opinion in Scotland with an authority, a weight and an earnestness with which none of us could compete. We miss him; we have often missed him, and I have never missed him more than to-day. I beg to move that the Rill be now read a second time.

Moved, That the Bill be now read 2^a—(The Lord Chancellor.)

THE DUKE OF BUCCLEUCH had given Notice to move, as an Amendment, That the Bill he read 2^a this day six months. The noble Duke said: My Lords, I must ask your Lordships' indulgence on this occasion, because I remember very well that my noble friend, Lord Finlay, in introducing a Bill consolidating the Income Tax law, said that if any layman tried to understand it he would probably find himself in a lunatic asylum. My noble and learned friend on the Woolsack has told your Lordships that the law of teinds is more difficult than any point in English law. In trying to study this law I have attempted to follow the advice of my noble and learned friend below me and not to go too far, but, if I bring upon myself the calamity which he prophesies, I only hope that my noble and learned friend on the Woolsack will be as kind to me as one of his predecessors is reputed to have been to the great Mr. Jorrocks.

As regards my motives in moving the rejection of this Bill, I agree very largely with that which has fallen from the noble and learned Viscount. It is often a convenient method of focussing opinion, where one does not quite know in what terms it is desired that a Bill should pass, to put down a Motion for rejection. It does not follow by any means that the Motion must be regarded as hostile to the Bill, and certainly I have never contemplated pressing it to a Division.

There is one thing certainly for which your Lordships have to be very grateful to the Church of Scotland. You owe to the Church of Scotland both the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Archbishop of York—the latter a son of a most distinguished minister of the Church of Scotland, with whom I have on more than one occasion had the honour of speaking from the same platform in the cause of Church defence, when my noble friend Viscount Novar, who introduced the Bill, and the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack, were both pledged to support those who wished to disendow and disestablish the Church of Scotland. I am glad to know that both of them have become converts to the views which I then held. It is the curious fact, as is even the case of these two noble converts, that converts often out-herod Herod. Viscount Novar has introduced a Bill which will give the Church of Scotland a great deal more than, in my opinion, it is justly entitled to, and the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack even goes further still, congratulate them upon their enthusiasm, and upon the principle which they have been now able to adopt.

There is only one other matter which I have to say before dealing with the Bill itself, and that is as to the constitution of the Departmental Committee. I am speaking on behalf of the heritors. We take certain exception to the constitution of the Committee—not to the members of the Committee, who are justly respected and valued throughout the country. This Committee had to deal not only with the union of the Churches but with the funds to which the Lord Chancellor has alluded. That Committee, of which the Lord Chancellor was Chairman, consisted of four members, two belonging to the Church of Scotland and two to the United Free Church. There was no representative on that Committee of any other Churches—perhaps it was not necessary—and no representative of the heritors. Not only that, but the heritors were never given any opportunity of putting their views before the Committee, or of offering evidence. What I think the noble and learned Viscount did do was this: two or three gentlemen who did not belong to the federation were asked in a private manner to come and see the Committee.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

They spoke at great length.

THE DUKE OF BUCCLEUCH

They may have done so, but they did not consult any of the heritors or members beforehand. The Secretary of the Scottish Land and Property Federation was not able to go with them, and although I happened to be President at the time, the thing was so secret that they were not able to tell me. The heritors feel that they were not fairly treated in this respect, and that it would have been much better if the Committee had tried to get them to assist by coming to some agreement, so that this Bill would not have been in any way opposed. The heritors, as a rule, are most anxious to come to an agreement over this Bill, but they do not see why they should have to pay more than they are required to pay under the law at the present time. This Bill is asking what has never been asked of Parliament before. The Church of Scotland, which is a minority Church—it is somewhat in the same position as the English Church in Wales—is now asking to have an Act passed giving it spiritual freedom, but at the same time giving it these endowments, which, although they undoubtedly belong to the Church, only belong to the present Church of Scotland by Act of Parliament.

They are asking Parliament to give them their endowments. I have no objection to that. I believe in an endowed Church, and I believe the Church of Scotland is the right one to have them. Also, if there is union with the United Free-Church, they will then certainly have a majority of Church people, if not a majority of the people. Now, according to Sir James Wilson, who is, I believe, a great authority on statistics, the total income of the Church of Scotland, including the stipends, is £1,175,000, whereas the total income of the United Free Church is £1,500,000, or £300,000 more than the income of the Church of Scotland. So, according to those figures, there might be rather more members of the United Free Church than of the Church of Scotland.

I understand—I may be wrong—that the conditions on which the United Free Church will join are these: they must have spiritual freedom, there must be control of endowments by the Church, and no rate shall be levied as at present. Therefore, I think that in the latter part of his speech the noble and learned Viscount was not quite correct when he was saying that this was only a question of the heritors. It is essential to union, I am informed, that the rate should be stopped. There is one thing perhaps which is difficult is explain. The heritor is what you might call the agricultural landowner; a teind is one-fifth of the gross rental of the agricultural land, but in many cases these teinds have been valued year ago. Once they are valued that value remains permanent. Some to this day are still unvalued. The stipend is fixed by these Fiars Courts—a very old institution which existed long before it was used for fixing the stipends of the Church. It: addition to this, the Minister, unless his stipend is as much as the teind, is allowed every twenty years to ask for augmentation; he goes to the court and the amount is fixed. The free teind is the difference between the stipend, which varies from year to year, and the amount of the teind. The other advantage which they have in the Church of Scotland is that the manses are kept up, and the ministers of the Church of Scotland do not pay rates on their stipends, as ministers of the Church of England do.

As regards the principle of the Bill and the union of the Churches, I think nearly everyone is agreed, and, if that union does take place, I hope it will be more complete than has been, in many cases, the union of the Free Church and the United Free Church, which took place, I think, over twenty years ago. I live close to a small town of 2,500 inhabitants. In it there is the parish church—the Established Church—and at least five, if not six, dissenting churches. Of those five or six dissenting churches three belong to the United Free Church, and although these two Churches amalgamated over twenty years ago, they still keep up throe churches with three congregations, which, in a town with a total population of 2,500, is quite unnecessary. It is for that reason that I say that if this union does take place I hope there will be a real amalgamation. At present, I think you will find throughout the South of Scotland that there are probably, for the size of the towns, more churches than in any other part of the world.

There is another point in regard to which I should like to criticise the Com- mittee. The Committee estimated that the annual value of the stipends in May, 1907, was £240,000, but they stated that this estimate was not very accurate. I really think that, fur the benefit of the country, and for their own information and for the information of Parliament, the Committee ought to have ascertained what the actual amount paid in stipends was. It would not have been difficult to do it, because it could have been ascertained through the Church. Had that been done it would have been very much easier to know what this Bill really means. Undoubtedly, so far as I can see from an examination of the Bill—and I do not think the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack will disagree with me—the £240,000 per annum which was mentioned is very much below what the stipends amount to at the present time.

The valuation of teinds has been going on for a long time. There was an order in the reign of Charles I that all teinds should be valued, and I believe that it is generally considered that a very large proportion, if not all, of them were valued at that time. Probably this Bill would not have, come before Parliament if the bulk—nearly allot those valuations had not been lost. It is put down, whether correct or not, to an act of Cromwell. After Cromwell had got the better of the forces of Scotland—I will not say conquered Scotland—he removed a very large number of documents from Edinburgh to London, and, after the Restoration, the documents were returned, but they were returned by sea. The ship sank—I think it was sunk by the Dutch—and a very large number of old records were lost. It is supposed that these valuations of teinds were lost in that ship. Anyhow, some of them still exist.

If the original valuation of teinds had existed, the stipends of ministers would have been many times less than they are at the present time, so that the Church of Scotland has been very fortunate in the destruction of those records, although the heritors, the landowners, have suffered to some extent. On the other hand, I must say that it has been the policy of a very large number of landowners that it is desirable that the minister should have a reasonable stipend. The Church of Scotland, I understand, is very anxious for union, but it says that, whatever happens, it must not, in any case whatever, suffer any loss. I do not want it to suffer any loss, but, on the other hand, the responsibility for a very large amount of money is being placed upon the heritors.

There are two real points in this Bill. One is the commutation to a fixed money basis, and the other is redemption. The commutation to a fixed money basis is not objected to, so long as the basis is a fair one. But what the heritors do object to altogether is redemption. There is no precedent for redemption, and, so far as can be seen, there is no particular reason for it. There is no instance to be found of Parliament ever compelling the redemption of payments of this kind. A very large number of the heritors are hard hit, and have not got the money to pay for the redemption. It will mean their final ruin. I admit that large heritors, like myself, may not be quite so hard hit, and there are others, like one of my noble friends whom I see on these benches, who have perhaps other sources from which to meet the charges; but for a large number of heritors this is a very-serious thing. And your Lordships must remember that the number of heritors has largely increased in the last few years. Many farmers have bought their farms, and many smallholders have acquired their holdings. You have to see that no injustice is done to these smaller men.

The noble and learned Viscount said he hoped some agreement would be come to between the Federation and the Church, and I sincerely hope that will be the case. There has been a meeting between the Committees of the two, but whether they will agree I cannot say. This is the ground of the Federation's case, and I think it will appeal to your Lordships: It may be desirable to formulate by way of general principles the attitude of the heritors on the whole question, and the following two propositions state the heritors' position: The Bill, being designed for purely Church purposes, should not impose any burden on the heritors for which they are not liable at present; and if the Church, for the sake of union, desires payment of stipend arranged otherwise than at present, such new arrangements ought not to be effected at the expense of the heritors. The Bill disregards both these principles in the following respects—First, the pro- posed compulsory redemption of stipends; secondly, the proposed compulsory redemption of surplus tiends; thirdly, the proposed granting of augmentations of stipend otherwise than in accordance with the existing law—that is, without the lapse of twenty years from the date of the previous augmentation—and, fourthly, the proposed imposition on the heritors of the expenses of (a) redemption of stipend, etc., (b) Tiend Bolls, and (c) augmentation processes where less than twenty years have elapsed since the previous augmentation.

In the opinion of the heritors the fatal blot on the Rill is its proposals with regard to the compulsory redemption of stipend. From the point of view of the heritors redemption is not desired. As a class they cannot afford to pay for it, and certainly not on the terms proposed in the Bill. There may be heritors throughout the country who are able and willing to redeem stipend, and by all means let the Bill contain provisions for the optional redemption of stipend, but it is highly objectionable to impose redemption by compulsion on unwilling heritors. That is a new burden which it is proposed to put on heritors for the purpose, it is said, of facilitating Church union. Why should the heritors be asked to pay for Church union? The heritors, not being concerned with union, are unable to appreciate why compulsory redemption of stipend ought to form a necessary preliminary to union. It is not obvious why it should be so, especially as the discussions throughout the country in Church presbyteries have indicated that the proposals in the Bill as to the terms of redemption do not commend themselves to the Church because they may not secure payment in perpetuity of the annual stipend.

To meet this apparently widespread view amongst the ministers of the Church, the Federation Committee submits the following proposals. This, of course, will also be subject to other things to be agreed to. At the present time the stipend is not, in law: a burden on the lands; it is merely a burden on the annual fruits. Though contrary to the general principle already enunciated that no new burden shall be imposed upon heritors in connection with Church union, the Federation Committee, with the desire to facilitate an agreed Bill, propose that the commuted value of the stipend on the basis proposed by the Haldane Committee and embodied in the Bill (although heritors consider there are strong grounds for the exclusion of the war years) should become a fixed annual money stipend not only on the fruits of the lands affected, but should be effectively made a legal burden on the lands themselves bringing stipend practically into a position corresponding to a feu-duty, and that the fixed money stipend, having this new legal quality of a burden on the lands, should rank on the lands to which it applies preferably to all existing securities or burdens other than burdens incident to the tenure. These proposals would secure to the Church the receipt in perpetuity of a non-fluctuating income, and if the Church, for its own purposes, should desire these fixed annual payments to be converted into capital sums, they could either negotiate with the respective heritors for redemption on such terms as may be agreed upon, or sell to the highest bidder the annuity which will have taken the place of the victual stipend.

That is the position of the heritors as well as I can put it. In spite of what the noble, and learned Viscount said, I have been informed that at the present time the best feu duties sell at about eighteen years' purchase. A year or two ago it was rather less than that; but that is what I have been told, and I have been inquiring lately rather particularly. In regard to the stipend, the Church has always said that it is only based on the fruits of the land, and that they have no ownership of the land itself. By that means they have escaped paying the rates which are levied on the clergy of the Church of England. Therefore, the fairest thing you can take in regard to the value of redemption, supposing it is redeemed, would be the feu duty. If the feu duty stands at eighteen years' purchase, why should the heritors be compelled, against their own wishes, against all precedent and against the law of the land, to redeem it at the price of Consols which may be anything up to thirty years' purchase.

It is a perfectly fantastic proposal that any one should be compelled to redeem at the price of Consols. I have never heard of such a thing. At the present time the best Government security is. I suppose, the 5 per cent. War Loan. It is known that there are a lot of trustees who keep Consols at an enhanced price, but it is perfectly absurd to say that any value of land is superior to the value of, and is worth a larger number of years purchase than, the 5 Per Cent. War Loan which on a 5 per cent. basis, would be twenty years, or a little less probably. Therefore, the whole argument for basing that on Consols is not only absolutely unfair but absolutely unpractical, and from a business point of view nobody would look at it. You have to look at Church property from the point of view of the number of years' purchase that it is worth. If, on the other hand, it is free of feu duty all the difficulties and an enormous amount of legal expense are saved, and there is no disadvantage whatever to the landowner to redeem these burdens and get clear of them. I need not go further than that.

The Church of Scotland issued a pamphlet criticising the Bill as introduced by my noble friend Viscount Novar and the Bill before your Lordships. In criticising it they objected to the twenty-two years' purchase. In their criticism they say: The Church is lese concerned with the question of capital value than with a certain and definite continuity of income. That is feu duty to begin with. They go on to say that this can be obtained in no other way than by following out the Haldane Report. I do not accept that, and I think your Lordships will agree that there are many other ways of getting a fixed income as well as by investment in Consols. That is what we object to as heritors. We object altogether to the compulsory redemption and we say that it would be very unfair and wrong of Parliament to insist upon it. If the Church wants to have this redemption carried out, although we are altogether against it, any extra cost incurred in doing it should be paid by them out of their funds.

The unfortunate heritors, who have been bled white in the last few years as I will show your Lordships later on, should not be asked to find the extra, money. I should like to point out that in paying the stipend to the minister Income Tax is deducted before it is paid, and therefore he does not have to pay Super-Tax. But on these instalments, unless a special clause is put into the Bill, they will have to pay both Income Tax and Super-Tax; so that every £100 that the unfortunate heritor had to pay by way of redemption and invest in Consols would take £210 of income; because £210 of income—taking rough figures—after paying Income Tax and Super-Tax, leaves £100. Therefore you will see that the burden on the heritor is very heavy, and if your Lordships would put a clause into the Bill to relieve him of that it would make the position somewhat better. Take the case in England. In England tithe is only binding on the man who pays it. In Scotland the heritor objects to compulsion, and I do not think there is any precedent in the legislation of this country for compulsion in such a case. I am sorry to have spoken so long, but it is a difficult and complicated matter.

The next point that arises is that of the standardised chalder. I think that if an agreement could be come to upon the matter of redemption, the other questions would not be so difficult. But we object very much to the standardised chalder. A good deal has been said about the Teinds Bill, which was introduced by the Secretary for Scotland in 1920. There was an agreement in that Bill, and a certain price was fixed for the chalder which was higher than the present price. As regards prices, therefore, any reference to the Teinds Bill as an argument is out of the question. Legislation was passed by Parliament to prevent tithe in England rising beyond a certain figure. The tithe in England was fixed according to a seven years' average, and was limited to the years 1918 till 1926. After seven years a Departmental Committee was appointed by the Secretary for Scotland to inquire into the question of the stipends in Scotland. That Committee unanimously reported that something should be done to mitigate the situation, but the ministers of the Church of Scotland said "No." They would not have anything of the kind; they wanted their pound of flesh, and, as your Lordships know, they got it.

At the time of the Teinds Bill in 1920 every one was under the impression that the price of bread was going to remain very high. It will be within your Lordships' recollection that an Agricultural Bill was introduced in 1920 by the Coalition Government guaranteeing the price of corn, under the belief that the price then prevailing was going to remain. Some of us, I remember, prophesied that prices would come down, because people would not stand those then prevailing. In six months that Bill had been repealed because prices had begun to fall. Precisely the same thing happened in regard to teinds. People in Scotland entertained the idea that prices were going to keep at a high level for a long time. Therefore the price of the chalder was fixed considerably higher than the price which has subsequently been obtainable for it. The object of the Teinds Bill was to relieve the heritors from the very heavy burden which fell upon then: in February, 1920, when they had to make the payments for the cropping year of 1919. It was thought that the sums which would have to be paid by the heritors would be so enormous that many of them would be unable to pay them, and that they would be made bankrupt, or, at all events, put into a serious position. The proceedings were delayed very much, so that this particular year did not come in.

It is not quite correct to say that was an agreed Bill. It was an agreed Bill only if the cropping year 1919 had come into it, because the price of the standardised chalder was fixed very much below what was then being paid. I think the minister pot 48 per cent. That gave an enormous immediate relief to the heritors, but, as the noble and learned Viscount pointed out, there is no relief to the heritors in the present Bill, because the ministers, until they die or take up other appointments, continue to have their stipends fixed according to the year's prices. No one objects to that, because it has been the general practice, but, as a matter of fact, there is no relief to the heritor. Therefore, to talk of the standardised chalder being so much less in price than it is at the present time is begging the question.

What you want to know is not what the price is now, but what it will be in twenty or thirty years' time. There is no particular reason for saying that it will be higher then than it was in pre-war days. We cannot, of course, tell, but so far as I can see there is no reason why it should be higher than before 1914. Therefore, if compulsory redemption is forced upon us, it is unfair to take the fifty years which have been selected. If fifty years are, taken they should be fifty normal years. They should not include the years during the war, and immediately after the war, when the prices were so high. So far as the Church of England is concerned the tithe payers were protected from paying a large amount. The Church of Scotland refused to accept a similar arrangement to that which was arrived at in England, and the ministers of Scotland have had the full amount for these, years. I say that it is unjust and unfair that those years should be included in arriving at an average.

May I give your Lordships some instances of how heavily this charge has pressed in Scotland? Take what happened in the cropping year 1919, as that was the year when the price was highest. It so happened that in my own estate, in the year 1913, the stipends paid to the ministers were something under £8,000. The rates have to be paid by the landlord. In 1919 the stipends paid to the ministers, were over £25,000. I give that illustration because it relates to a large estate, and I think your Lordships can take it that it would be found more or less correct if applied over the whole of Scotland. I will lake another instance, also an estate of my own, to show who has been getting money, and who has not With respect to this estate the audited accounts made up to the end of October, 1920, show that the gross rental was. £42,500. When all rates and taxes and legal outgoings had been paid—I mean the outgoings which are allowed exemption from Income Tax—the ministers received £3,859 (after tax was paid) and the landowner received £485. I have not the figures for the same estate for the year 1921, but I do not think they were any better. I do not complain. The ministers have a right to it. Still, when you have these huge sums, I do not think it is fair that these abnormal years should be taken into account in arriving at an average which is to be the determining factor for payments in the future.

I will give your Lordships another instance. In one parish of 1,845 acres the stipend paid in the cropping year 1919 was £1,424. As your Lordships can well' see, after paying rates and taxes and various other charges, there would not be much left for the landowner. I have here the case of eleven parishes in the south of Scotland. In 1911 the total stipends in these parishes amounted to £4,251, and in 1919 to £13,683. I have also the case-of two parishes which show how the cost has gone up in the last few years. Your Lordships are, no doubt, aware that augmentation every twenty years is calculated on a seven years' average on the petition of the minister that he is "hard up." He asks for augmentation, which he generally receives. In one of these parishes the population in 1851 was 1,732, in 1921 it was 990, or rather more than half. On the seven years' average ending 1855 the minister got £249; on the seven years' average ending 1874 he got £311: on the seven years' average ending 1895 he got £313; and on the seven years' average ending 1921, when the last augmentation was asked for, he got £939, or three times as much as when augmentation was asked for previously.

Although the stipend has increased to nearly four times what it was in 1855 the population has decreased by nearly one-half. In the other parish it is much the same. The population has decreased from 1,400 to 827, while the stipend has risen from £249 to £932. It only shows how much has been taken out of these unfortunate heritors, who are to be further penalised under this Bill. I think some consideration must be given to their ease. I do not see why it should be anticipated that prices will keep up so very high. Prices do not depend on the cost of labour and production in this country, but largely on the amount of imports and what they can be sold at, and if shipping is cheap there is no reason why prices should keep up. The only fail-way is to take an average of fifty normal years, not including war years.

I should like to show your Lordships the differences which exist, the inequalities which we desire to remedy. I have here the case of a property in Forfarshire of a gross rental of £1,200. The teinds were valued very early, about 1630, and the result was that on this £l,200 the heritor pays £15. The probabilities are that if the valuation had been made more recently he would have to pay £300 or £400. It shows what an enormous disparity there is in many of these cases. It is not the fault of the Church; it is largely the fault of the landowner. When rents were lower they should have had their land valued.

The next point is augmentation. I think augmentations should be limited somewhat. There should be one augmentation only. It is rather a Committee point, but let me point out that in almost every case where a large augmentation is-allowed the reason given is that the lands have been so greatly improved in recent years. Suppose any of your Lordships owned a farm in Scotland and spent a sufficient sum of money on it to increase the value of the farm by £100, about £20 of that would be taken by the teind. It has not been altogether an encouragement to people to improve their land. You might get a gross rental of £20, but your Lordships who have dealt with land know that the net rental would be nothing like that. It means that in many eases the Church, by the improvement of the land, has got great advantage and the landowner very little.

There is another objection to unlimited augmentation. I am informed that under this Bill power is given to take endowments from one parish and use them elsewhere. That is really most unfair. The noble and learned Viscount said there were many industrial places where churches had sprung up, and that money might be taken from the less populous parishes and used there. It sounds all very well, but I do not think it is right. That money is provided for that parish and for parish purposes, and I do not think it should be used anywhere else. What follows from this argument? If there is this money which it is desired to use in other parishes it follows that in many cases ministers are much overpaid. If there is this surplus, then the money should remain in the parish, as agricultural land is very heavily taxed now in order to pay for the education of the industrial and manufacturing districts. If there is this surplus, more than sufficient to meet the necessities of the minister, then it should be used towards reducing the cost of the education rates in that parish. If the power is given to use these endowments from one parish to another, it means that, not only will the agricultural districts be paying, as they are now paying, for the education of the industrial districts, but they will also be taxed in addition. When people in this country talk of abolishing food taxes, they often forget that agriculture, which produces the food, is taxed more heavily than other industries, except, of course, in the case of special duties, such as those levied on beer, whisky and so on.

The other points are comparatively small ones. The teind roll has to be made up, and the teinds have to be paid, and the whole of the cost of this is placed on the heritors. This is not done at the request of the heritor, but at the request of the Church, and I think it is only reasonable that the Church should pay, if not the whole of the cost, at any rate a share of it. Why should a special law be passed to the effect that, where there is to be extra expenditure for the benefit of the Church, and at the request of the Church, another person is to be called upon to pay? I do not think that is reasonable, and I think the figures quoted of what happened during the war, and many similar instances, show that the cost ought to be divided. As regards the valuation, the Bill takes account of improvements during the last twenty years. I do not wish to be unreasonable, but I am not at all sure that it should not cover the last 100 years, and that some, allowances should not also be made for rates in calculating the value of the teind.

There is another point. The discharge of these endowments will involve a very large amount. It is difficult to estimate it, but I think I am probably right in saying that the cost of carrying the work through will come to several hundred thousand pounds. I know of one parish alone where the creation of a teind roll will cost between three and four thousand pounds, and the probabilities are that the capital sum to be paid to the Church will not be less than £7,000,000, and may well be more. If Parliament is going to make this compulsory, surely it is unfair that the people who are to be forced to do a thing of this kind should have to pay the whole of it.

As regards the manses, I am not altogether in disagreement with my noble friend. It has always been the duty of the heritors to keep these manses and churches in repair, and this has been a great advantage to the Church. In one parish, where I am the largest heritor, the church was burnt down about two years ago, and only the walls were left standing. We had to replace it, though we were not obliged to replace it in the most ornamental style. In that, particular case we were lucky to have the insurance, and it did not cost a great deal more than that. Unfortunately, many relics were lost which could not be replaced. The minister and members of the Church asked us to pay a certain sum, and they did the rest themselves. The fact remains that the burden is an onerous one, and, as I said before, I think it one of the essential conditions of the United Free Churches' joining, that this rate should no longer be levied. Though there may be some relief in the future, the probabilities are that, under the present Bill, the existing heritors will be called upon to pay more than they would have had to pay during the rest of their lives, and though this may be useful to their successors, the measure will not be any real relief to them.

The real point of the Bill is that it gives no immediate relief to people who are very hard pressed. On the contrary, it puts a large extra burden upon them which many of them cannot afford to bear. The total charge is estimated as two and a half million pounds. A large number of Church people are very anxious to come to an agreement, and I am sure the heritors concur, though there are a certain number of people on either side who are, perhaps, rather violent and extreme. I think it would be a very great advantage if this Bill could be adjusted, but I think, as has been said by others, that since the number of heritors has been very greatly increased since the war, it would be an unfortunate thing for the Church of Scotland and for the country if this Bill left any bitterness behind in the minds of these people or made them antagonistic to the Church.

I must say that the attitude of the Church in not coming to any compromise over the stipends in the year when they were so high has been felt very keenly by many. I will not say that they acted in an un-Christian spirit, but they certainly acted in a harsh manner. I do not make that any cause of complaint myself, for it was a legal right, but I think the Church must be careful. The one thing which it wants in these days is to get all the support it can, and to retain the confidence of the country. In these circumstances I hope that both the Church and the heritors may be able to come to some agreement, and that controversy may be, so far as possible, eliminated, so that some Bill can be produced which will be alike satisfactory to the Church which enjoys these endowments and to those who have to pay them.

Amendment moved— Leave out ("now") and at the end of the Motion insert ("this day six months")—(The Duke of Buccleuch.)

VISCOUNT FINLAY

My Lords, I rise to say only a very few words with regard to this Bill. I desire, in the first instance, to express the satisfaction which, I am sure, everybody felt when the noble Duke stated at the beginning of his speech that his Amendment on the Paper did not imply any hostility to this I measure. For my own part, I really did not need any assurance on this subject, for I was certain of it, but at the same time I think the noble Duke will recognise that the terms of his Amendment, might have been misconstrued, and it is most satisfactory to know from him that his desire would be that this measure should come to fruition.

The points to which the noble Duke has referred are interesting, and some of them are important. I have no doubt that they will receive the most attentive consideration when they are brought up by the noble Duke in Committee. I think it would be difficult to exaggerate the interest which the people of Scotland feel, not, indeed, in the details of the Bill, but in its general scope. It carries out that which has long been the aspiration of a great portion of the people of Scotland—I think I may say nearly the whole of them—and it is a great satisfaction to find this Bill introduced under such excellent auspices, framed by the noble Viscount who sits beside me, and introduced by the Lord Chancellor in a speech to which, if I may say so, I listened with admiration, characterised as it was by perfect lucidity and complete knowledge of a very intricate subject as affecting the ecclesiastical situation in Scotland. The further progress of this Bill will be watched in Scotland with the most intense interest, and I most sincerely hope that all Parties in your Lordships' House will unite in an effort to make the Bill the best possible Bill in the circumstances. I think that in the hands in which this Bill now is, with the assistance of other members of your Lordships' House who are thoroughly cognizant of the subject, there is every reason to hope that this Bill will be successfully passed.

VISCOUNT NOVAR

My Lords, I have, in the first place, to acknowledge the very favourable assurances given by the Lord Chancellor as to the character of the Command Paper. Those of us who travelled up from Scotland last night were only aware from the Order Paper of the Notice for the Second Reading of the Bill, and when we were confronted with the Command Paper on arrival it looked as if we were going to take the Committee discussion along with the Second Reading. I could not, of course, have promised to vote for the list of Amendments. I think that the House will have gathered from the Command Paper, and from the speech of the noble Duke, that there is the prospect before us of a strenuous and interesting period in Committee, unless certain difficulties can be arranged in Scotland during the interval, which, along with the noble and learned Viscount, I most sincerely trust will be the case.

I would express our thanks to the noble Viscount and those who served with him on the Departmental Committee, whose Report, although I do not agree with all the, findings, prepared the way for the Bill which I had the honour to introduce in January when the House met. The labour of Committees is often given in vain, but in this case the Bill followed upon the heels of the Report. It is drafted upon its lines save, in one extremely important and some minor respects. I regret that circumstances have prevented the Bill from becoming law before the Assemblies meet next month, but it is satisfactory to know that the noble and learned Viscount has taken the Second Beading of the Bill thus early in the Session.

As your Lordships are aware, the evolution of the Church of Scotland has been the result of centuries of toil and struggle. The age of persecution was followed by contests over the State connection and patronage, which led to the disruption, and that was followed by the movement to which the noble Duke referred—and in which he included more than one member of your Lordships' House—namely, a movement to secure disestablishment and disendowment of the Established Church. That political, one might almost say ecclesiastical, movement was in full activity when some of us entered public life. Then it was believed that secularisation of teinds was a necessary step to union, and the first step in the process of healing our divisions came by a union of the two voluntary branches of Presbyterianism outside the Established Church.

Now we have reached another, and final, stage, in the process of which the ultimate outcome will be to restore to Scotland a great, united and powerful Presbyterian Church, retaining its endowments. This Bill is the second of two Parliamentary measures, necessary to clear the way to reunion. The first was the Church of Scotland Bill introduced into the House of Commons in 1921 by the then Secretary for Scotland, now Lord Alness. That was passed almost without opposition. It was urged by critics that the provisions of this Bill now before the House should be included in Lord Alness's measure. Experience has shown that any such attempt to hasten matters would have been unwise, and the reasons given by Mr. Munro, in his brilliant exposition, for limiting the scope of his Bill were convincing.

That Bill gave legal sanction to alterations approved by the Assemblies in matters of constitution, discipline and declarations of doctrine. It disposed of the fundamental and spiritual questions which divided the Church. It was further agreed by the Assemblies that endowments were rather a matter for settlement as between Church and State, that they should not be secularised, and that a united Church should hold them as the property of that Church. It was this question of endowments that was considered and reported upon by the Departmental Committee, over which the noble and learned Viscount presided, and this Bill was framed to carry out their recommendations, so as to dispose once for all of the last impediment to reunion.

The terms of reference to the Departmental Committee were that they should inquire as to what readjustments in the tenure of the endowments were expedient in view of the Church Act, 1921, in order to facilitate Church union. In preparing the Bill, a task which the Committee rendered comparatively easy, the one matter which gave rise to anxious consideration was that of the proposed terms of settlement as between Church and heritor. The heritor has nothing to gain or lose by Church union, and, as such, the matter has little interest for him. He may be, very often is, in communion with another Church. All he is naturally anxious to secure under the Bill is an equitable adjustment of rights and liabilities as between himself and the Church. He has nothing to gain by redemption, and may have difficulty in finding money to pay up a capital charge. He will be put to in-convenience in order to assist the Church which has so far held the opinion that such redemption is an essential preliminary step to union. Personally, I appreciate the advantage of paying off the Church, but most heritors would prefer that teinds should take the form of a fixed charge on land. Meanwhile, the representatives of both parties are in touch, and will, it is hoped, arrive at some satisfactory conclusion.

The subject is dry, but I must explain to your Lordships, very briefly, the deviations in my Bill from the recommendation of the Endowments Committee. I hope to convince your Lordships that the provisions of the Bill as it stands are necessary to an equitable settlement. With regard to the redemption of stipend, the proposal of the Endowments Committee is that redemption should be made either (a) by a single payment of such sum as would, if invested in Consols at the time, produce in interest an annual sum equal to the stipend to be redeemed, or by the transfer of a like amount of Consols, or (b) by a rentcharge equal to the stipend, plus an addition of at least ten per cent, as a finking fund, by means of which the amount of Consols necessary to produce the fixed annual payment should be provided. This means that if a single payment redemption were made at recently ruling prices, the Church might receive a sum of money which represented 25 years' purchase of the fixed annual payment, and would have it in its power to invest that sum of money next day in feu-duties bought at considerably fewer years' purchase—feu-duties being the recognised form of security for Church investments, for instance, of the endowments of quoad sacra parishes under the direction of the Court, and for additional endowments and other funds invested by the Church itself to procure a fixed return.

In lieu of the Committee's proposal the Bill, in Clause 12, provides for the redemption on a basis of twenty-two years' purchase. The present payments of stipend by a heritor are secured on the fruits of the land. If that security were replaced by something in the nature of a rentcharge of an amount equal to the fixed annual money payment due by the heritor the Church would be at least as well off, if not better off, as regards the nature of the security. The Church's object in seeking redemption is to secure complete separation of the payment of stipends from the land, and undoubtedly this is an object which has been regarded by the Church hitherto as necessary in the interest of Union; but it seems that the provision of a rentcharge would meet this object by placing it in the power of the Church to realise the rentcharge, and thus secure the desired separation from the land, if they choose to adopt that course.

Further, it does not appear to be unfair that the Church should take the risk of loss or gain on the realisation of the rent-charge, seeing that such realisation is entirely for the benefit of the Church, and not for the benefit of the heritors In addition to these general considerations, it must be kept in view that redemption by Consols would involve certain administrative difficulties and disadvantages. The amount of the annual sinking fund payment would be fixed, but its duration would be indefinite. A separate account would have to be kept of each redemption transaction, and the purchaser of land, subject to a rent-charge for stipend, could ascertain the position as regards redemption only by an examination of the particular account

Moreover, the amount of Consols is limited. The investment is one which is much in request, so much so that Consols usually command an appreciably higher price than other forms of Government securities. The knowledge that the Church of Scotland would be a consider able purchaser each half-year would almost certainly affect the price of Consols to the detriment of the redeeming heritors. It would be immaterial to the Church at what price they bought Consols, and there would probably be frequent controversies between Church and heritors as to whether the former ought to have bought for a particular account at a price more favourable to the heritor Most of these difficulties would be avoided by the method of redemption proposed in the Bill. By that method the amount of the annual rentcharge would be fixed, as also would be the period. A purchaser would see at a glance what the annual payment was, and how many more payments required to be made. The record of the bond in the Register of Sasines, the receipt for payment of the last half year's charge, would give a purchaser all that he needed to know on the subject, and there would be no room for disputes, such as would arise over the purchase of Consols.

Under the Bill, where the capital payment involved exceeds £22, the heritor is given the option of substituting for a single capital payment a fixed annual payment upon the land sufficient to redeem the stipend within fifty years, the rate of interest on accumulating instalments being assumed at 4½ per cent. Where the heritor's liability is less than 20s. a year the trouble and cost of applying this system become almost prohibitory, and for that reason the discharge of any capital liability by the heritor of less than £22 is of advantage. That, no doubt, is a matter susceptible of adjustment, but there is that very solid reason in favour of the provision in the Bill. I regard, therefore, the proposal that heritors should redeem stipends in Consols as unacceptable. In this matter I am in complete accord with the noble Duke, and would have to resist any Amendment which sought to restore that recommendation of the Endowment Committee to the Bill.

On the other hand, I sincerely hope that the Bill will be allowed to go forward to Committee. Every endeavour was made so to frame it that, while dealing equitably with the heritors, it should preserve the rights of the Church sanctioned by the law and custom of centuries. Minor points should be susceptible of adjustment. The Church is in no need of driving a hard bargain. The income of the two Churches when united will be over £2,500,000. That of the United Free Church is £1,500,000, arising from congregational liberality; that of the Established Church is nearly £1,200,000—£240,000 of which represents stipends from teind, or less than ten per cent. of the total income. Supposing there was any little loss on that ten per cent. it can easily be made good on economies following union.

I have now indicated the main deviation of the Bill from the recommendations of the Endowment Committee—that is, the terms on which redemption should be carried. The basis of 22 years is, I think, a generous one in the light of recent transactions in agricultural land. Many farms changed hands at lower rates even when prices were highest. Nevertheless, many presbyteries not only clamour for Consols but deprecate the standard valuation of the chalder being struck at an average of the last fifty years. They ask for twenty or even a ten years' average, a most unfair average to take, seeing that for ten years it was greatly raised by the war, and many stipends rose to well over four figures, and often absorbed any clear income left to the heritor who was legally restrained from raising his rent. Presbyteries demur to the provision relieving heritors of further responsibility for the upkeep of fabrics and manses after they have once handed them over to the Church in good repair. Here, again, they are trying to drive a too hard bargain. Heritors have been owners of extensive seat rights which fall to the Church, and large economies in the number and maintenance of fabrics and manses, unduly multiplied through sectional activities, must necessarily follow upon union.

I would suggest to the Church that it would be wise to facilitate this great transference of rights and property without friction. For it would be extremely unfortunate if the great achievement of union were marred by any suspicion that the Church was insisting on its pound of flesh "to the twentieth part of one poor scruple." Moreover, the fact that the burden of the national Church rests, somewhat illogically, upon the industry of agriculture alone and the fact that this industry, struggling with depression, is already depleted of capital, would make any hard bargain unpopular in the country. Through the dispersion of estates and increase of feus many heritors are small men. They have often but recently acquired their farms, and all have been equally weighed down with the incidence of public burdens. It would not only be unfair but exceedingly disastrous to the country to take a shilling too much from men in such a situation. It is time, therefore, to face the more sordid aspects of the controversy in a spirit of compromise and common sense. The one thing that matters is to take at the flood the tide that set for union; else it will ebb and may never set that way again.

The Presbyterian Church is still strong in Scotland. But the activities of another great Church, and of those who belong to no Church at all, already threaten its supremacy. So that we cannot help fearing sometimes that the Scots people are breaking from their old-time moorings. If they did, the whole character of the country would be changed. There never was a time in the history of the Church when it had a greater call to service or when there was greater need that it should stand four square and undivided. It is in the belief that this Bill will assist the Church to fulfil her high mission that I earnestly commend it to your Lordships.

VISCOUNT YOUNGER OF LECKIE

My Lords, this Bill has been so very exhaustsively discussed that I apologise for intervening for a moment to say a few words upon one or two points. I cordially agree with the noble Viscount below me in hoping that this Bill will receive a Second Beading. Every one in Scotland is very anxious to-day to facilitate Church union so far as it is possible, and I think it would be a very great blow to many people if this Bill did not proceed upon its course. I may, however, take very strong objection to the most exceptional proposals in the Bill in regard to the redemption of teinds. I do not think any other law has ever been passed which places that compulsion in these or any other circumstances upon the owners of the land or upon any one else. In the present circumstances of the landowners in Scotland, it would be an appalling and perfectly impossible burden in many cases.

So far as I am personally concerned, I am happy to say that I am a very small landowner and it would not matter very much to me if I were to commute my teind or to redeem it. But commutation is one thing and redemption is another. Commutation is a desirable thing. I am very pleased to see it in this Bill, and I hope it will be carried out on fair and reasonable terms. As I have said, redemption is an entirely different matter. In the district from which I come and in which my property is situate, there are many of my neighbours who can only exist at the present time by letting their houses and living very exiguously on what they have left after paying the ordinary taxation. Heavy burdens have been placed upon them largely by means of local rates for education, roads, and so forth, since the war, and to add to those burdens the obligation to redeem the teinds is a monstrous proposal. Some of the larger landowners would, no doubt, redeem their teinds. Others with different sources of income would probably wish to do so. I think there ought to be a permissive power of redemption in the Bill so that any one who wishes may avail himself of it. The imposition on these unfortunate people of the compulsory obligation to redeem is a provision which I hope will not receive the assent of your Lordships' House. I do not propose to assent to the Second Reading of the Bill, which I should cordially do otherwise, without leaving to myself the right to oppose that proposal in Committee.

1 think the noble Duke who so exhaustively dealt with the Bill said nothing about one point—namely, the redemption of surplus teinds. That is another wholly unnecessary obligation, and it has nothing to do with Church union at all. It has no influence one way or the other on Church union, and, with all respect to the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack, I am not at all certain that he did not go beyond his reference in the recommendations he made on the subject. I also reserve that point for consideration in Committee. In regard to the two points to which I have referred, the Bill has gone, I think, beyond the existing obligations which landowners are bound to meet. Otherwise, I hope that it will be received in the spirit in which it ought to be received.

LORD BALFOUR OF BURLEIGH

My Lords, the noble Duke did not actually make the Amendment which stands in his name, and I think that he was very wise indeed in following that course. In the course of his remarks he said that the principle of this Bill is an agreed principle. In that case surely it is right that your Lordships should give it a Second Reading. What is required is simply a framework. The question of Church union is one about which public opinion in Scotland is absolutely united. The framework of this Bill is required. The alteration which is to take place is merely a question of the alteration of the tenure of the endowments of the Church. It is not a question of less or more. It is only a question of finding out what is fair. It is very difficult to find out what is fair, but with the good will which will undoubtedly be brought to bear there can really be no question whatever that before the Committee stage is reached there ought to be an agreed settlement.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

My Lords, I do not want to add anything to this discussion. It is a very dry discussion and requires a very special taste, though, perhaps, it is not amiss that your Lordships have, for once, had a Scottish afternoon. But there are two misapprehensions to which reference was made by some of your Lordships, and I wish, in a sentence or so, to put them right. My noble friend Lord Younger appeared to think that the obligation of redemption is an addition to the burden of the landowner in Scotland. It is nothing of the sort. It is diminishing his burden. There is no provision in the Bill, or in the Report, which makes the landowner pay a lump sum—none. On the contrary, all it says is that he is to pay his present standard or somewhat less than that, and a small addition to the sinking fund.

VISCOUNT YOUNGER OF LECKIE

With great respect, I was talking of the present Bill and not of the Lord Chancellor's Amendments.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

Am I to understand the noble Viscount to say that he is not speaking of the present Bill?

VISCOUNT YOUNGER OF LECKIE

When I spoke I was talking of the present Bill and the obligation which is therein placed upon the landowner to redeem his teinds. I was not talking of the Amendments in the White Paper.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

The Bill does not place any obligation on the landowner to pay a lump sum; on the contrary, it leaves him to pay his present standard, or rather less than the present standard, because it is taken on the new value, and a small addition to the sinking fund. What does the landowner pay I He pays £21 13s., so that he puts into his pocket 33s. a year over the transaction.

THE DUKE OF BUCCLEUCH

For one year.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

No, for every year. That is all he has to pay, and that is the whole of his obligation, and if the noble Viscount studies the Bill more closely than he appears to have done he will find that is so. That really is the answer to the objection of my noble friend Viscount Novar. You are not imposing any higher burden on the landlord than he has to bear at the present time; you are imposing a less burden. These are the explanations I wish to make before the Question is put.

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