A very large number. I do not pretend that they are all very serious amendments or that they raise very serious issues. But there was a large number of serious amendments accepted—some of them my own. These amendments considerably extended the scope of the Bill, and I submit they go a long distance to meet the demands of nearly all parties.
I do not intend to deal with the amendments which are verbal. I only intend to deal with amendments which are important and which are in connection with contentious issues. I have accepted, I should say, about five important amendments in connection with issues that have been debated here in the Dáil often—amendments that different parties hold different views about. These amendments represent, to some extent, a compromise between the views of parties on these particular issues. That is, I think, if I may say so, the right function of a select committee—to find such right compromise, and in that respect, at all events, if not in other respects, this select committee was useful.
The first amendment is in connection with building ground. Deputies will remember that building ground was excepted simpliciter from the Land Act of 1923. That was not the first time that building ground came up for discussion in connection with Land Acts here and elsewhere. It was excepted from practically every Act passed since 1880, dealing with agricultural holdings. We continued that tradition, rightly or wrongly, in the Land Act of 1923. There was more reason, as a matter of fact, to continue it in the Land Act of 1923 than in the others, because in the Land Act of 1923 there was power taken to purchase what were called "future tenancies"—that is to say, agricultural tenancies, which were subject to termination at a year's notice, and the tenant of which could not get a fair rent fixed. That extended the Land Act of 1923 a long way. As we had extended the Act to all tenancies, no matter when created— even though created in the immediate past—and in view of the fact that these tenancies were created between people in exactly the same circumstances in life, and for temporary reasons, and created deliberately as terminable tenancies, we were extending the Land Act of 1923 in a very big way. For that reason there was all the more cause to be careful about problems like building ground in connection with the Land Act of 1923. The case was made that this particular exemption from the Land Act of 1923 was operating harshly in a great many cases. First of all, there was an undoubted grievance in a typical case where a man owned 200 acres of land, and where the Judge held that though only five acres of it adjoined the road, and was, therefore, building ground, the whole farm, notwithstanding that it was held as a judicial tenancy, was exempt from the Act. That was obviously unfair, and it was only necessary to see that state of affairs in existence to get the admission at once that that had to be dealt with. That was dealt with, first of all, in this way:—It was decided that where the Judge found that a portion of the holding was building ground, that portion should be sub-divided from the rest, and the remainder of the holding purchased, after the rent had been apportioned, on the terms set out in the Land Act of 1923, and that the building ground portion should remain as it was—that is, as a present tenancy or a future tenancy for a definite period. That definite period was fixed at five years. It was provided that during that five years the tenant would have security of tenure on that building ground except as against the landlord, and except as against the landlord, who had rights over it for one purpose and one purpose only. He had a right to take it up for immediate building. If the landlord failed to exercise that right to build or begin building on this land within five years, then it automatically vested in the tenant under the Land Purchase Acts on his application. I think it is generally agreed by all parties that that meets that case fairly.
There was then the question of subtenancies. There were a number of sub-tenancies in the country—not a very large number, but a considerable number. I could not even give the approximate figures, but Deputies can take it they were a number sufficiently large to make it a genuine grievance for a considerable number of people. There were a number of such tenancies existing on holdings that had been purchased under the previous Land Acts, that is, under the Ashbourne Act, the Land Acts of 1903 and 1909. These tenancies, as a rule, came into existence after purchase, and they are in existence now for a great many years. Under the Act of 1923 these sub-tenancies could not be purchased. I should not use the word "sub-tenancies" in such cases, because a man who has purchased his tenancy is no longer a tenant. He is owner in fee, subject to a mortgage. The common name for them is "sub-tenants." They were sub-tenants, if you like, of purchased holdings. These holdings are now purchasable on terms practically agreed to by the Committee—that is to say, they are purchasable in the same way as tenancies which existed and which were purchased under the Act of 1923, whether judicial or non-judicial. They are getting exactly the same terms. They are referred to as "agricultural tenancies." I am not quite clear whether there could be a judicial tenancy of such a holding. They are generally non-judicial. They might be what are called "present tenancies"—tenancies which could not be terminated except for failure to pay rent. Or they might be future tenancies, terminable on a year's notice. They generally were future tenancies, although there were some exceptions. All these tenancies are purchasable in exactly the same way as if they were tenancies under the ordinary Land Acts and subject to a land annuity.
With regard to fishing rights, fishing rights were reserved to the State under the Land Act of 1923. I thought that that was right and I still think it is right, as a rule. But this gave rise to a rather peculiar state of affairs. Land had been purchased under the Act of 1903 on the banks of a river in respect of which the fishing rights had been transferred to the tenants, while the fishing rights in respect of lands on the opposite side of the river, purchased under the 1923 Act, were reserved to the State. That gave rise to a most extraordinary anomaly, that tenants up and down the river, who had previously purchased, owned these fishing rights, while tenants who purchased under the Act of 1923 on an estate between them did not own them. That was obviously an impossible situation. If one body had the rights it might be possible to make something out of them, but it would be quite impossible to make anything out of them where you had two distinct bodies, and we take power, in order to meet that sort of case, where the Land Commission thinks fit, to transfer the fishing rights to the tenant. That is not compulsory.
We made a slight change, if it is a change, in regard to mill holdings. It was not the intention of the Land Act of 1923 that what used to be called mill holdings should be exempt from the Act, and, in fact, disused mill holdings were not exempt. When there is a question as to whether a holding agricultural or not, and that is a question on which such an issue would turn, it comes before the Judicial Commissioner, and the effect of the Land Act of 1923 is that holdings which were originally let as mill holdings and which are now disused, should not be exempt. But it was found that for one reason or another, in some cases, if you like, borderland cases, mill holdings were exempt, even while the mill was not in use. We make it clear that a holding originally let as a mill holding, and on which the mill is now disused, shall be purchased as an agricultural tenancy when the other requisites of an agricultural tenancy are present. Of course, on this question we will meet with some difficulties, as we did before, though not perhaps as many. A mill holding on which there is a disused mill will come up before the Judicial Commissioner. He will reject it as an agricultural holding, for perhaps an entirely different reason, and people will come to the conclusion that it is because a mill is on it. In any event it is quite clear from the Act now that a disused mill is not a ground against the holding being regarded as agricultural. On the other hand, there are cases that will come in now that did not come in before.
Now we come to fee farm grants, and this is an important point. Deputies will remember that in the Act of 1923 fee farm grants were dealt with. In the congested districts land held under fee farm grants vested automatically as untenanted land in the Land Commission: they had the powers which they had in regard to any other land which vested in them and which they did not need for congests or for distribution. They had power to sell to anybody, including the owner, and they sold it to the owner. But the fee farm grantee, the man who occupied the land in the congested districts, was in the happy position that where he owed arrears of rent the Land Commission could allocate a certain amount of the purchase money, which should go for the tenant's interest and which corresponded to the amount of rent that was in arrear to the owner, which was, in fact, adding the arrears to the purchase money. So that in the congested districts fee farm grantees, in fact, purchased their lands under a system which enabled them to add the arrears of rent to the purchase money. Outside the congested districts the system was somewhat different.