The Landlord and Tenant (Ground Rents) Act, 1978, prevents the creation of new ground rents on dwellinghouses. The Landlord and Tenant (Ground Rents) (No. 2) Act, 1978, provides, as regards existing ground rents on dwellinghouses, a low cost purchase scheme and the Landlord and Tenant (Ground Rents) (Amendment) Act, 1987, extends indefinitely the operation of that scheme.
The existing law, therefore, provides a ready means by which any person can terminate the ground rent payable on his dwellinghouse. A considerable number of people have availed themselves of that opportunity.
Nobody may be committed to prison merely for non-payment of ground rent or any other debt. A person may be committed to prison for failure to comply with a court order to make certain payments in discharge of a debt, an order which may be made only after an examination of means designed to establish that the person can pay and that failure to pay is due to his wilful refusal or culpable neglect. It does not appear to me that there is any rational basis on which a distinction can be made between the enforcement of court orders concerning ground rent debts and court orders concerning other civil debts.