Dáil Éireann debate -
Thursday, 9 Feb 1939

Vol. 74 No. 2

Valuation Bill, 1938—Second Stage.

Minister for Finance (Mr. MacEntee)

I move that this Bill be now read a Second Time. The detailed explanatory memorandum which I caused to be circulated to Deputies with the Bill indicates in broad outline the existing statutory provision in regard to valuation. It also states the reasons which, in the view of the Government, render necessary new legislation providing for a complete revaluation of every piece of immovable property in the State, with the exception of agricultural land and railways.

As the explanatory memorandum shows, the valuation made by Richard Griffith in the years 1852 to 1865 may be said to be still in force for rating purposes throughout the entire country, save in the City of Dublin within its pre-1930 boundaries, and the City of Waterford. These two cities were revalued in the period between 1908-15 for Dublin, and 1924-26 for Waterford, but—and it is important to note this—on a basis of pre-war money values in both cases. Outside these two areas, many buildings have not come under the review of the Valuation Office for 20, 30 or 50 years —and even longer periods; and such as did come up for revision had to be valued on about 1860 values—so far as it was humanly possible to arrive at these. Consequently, throughout the whole Twenty-Six Counties, when valuing property for rating purposes and in levying rates, no account is or can be taken under the present law of the very large increase in rental value levels which has occurred since 1914. But this is not all. Except within the City of Waterford and certain portions of the City of Dublin, we must, as the law now stands, when valuing property, disregard not only the increase in rentals which has taken place since 1914, but even the increases which took place prior to that date and since 1865.

I think the House will agree that this is an absurd position, and one which it is quite impossible to defend. It is a position which creates inequities not merely as between one ratepayer and another or one taxpayer and another, but as between whole classes of ratepayers, as between whole classes of taxpayers, as between direct taxpayers and indirect taxpayers, as between urban ratepayers and rural ratepayers, as between the wealthy municipalities and the rest of the country, and as between the wealthier inhabitants of those municipalities and their less fortunate fellow-citizens. The present cadastre of valuations, in short, is an anachronism, an indefensible anachronism, which by reason of the injustices and anomalies that derive from it, is injurious to the credit of our public authorities, and tends to impede all social progress.

It has been suggested that the main purpose of this Bill is to secure more revenue for the Exchequer. That is a foolish suggestion. Admittedly, in 1932, this Bill, from an Exchequer point of view, would have been of first-class importance in that year, for at that time, due to the defective basis upon which income from property was being assessed, property owners were then escaping their fair share of the income-taxes to the tune of perhaps £500,000, and were doing this at the expense of the Exchequer and, therefore, of their fellow-taxpayers.

Since 1932, however, the position has been largely redressed. We have had the enactment of Section 6 of the Finance Act, 1932, under which rent arising out of business premises is assessed under Schedule D on the amount by which the net rent exceeds the valuation, and we have also had Section 3 of the Finance Act, 1935, under which Schedule A assessments (with certain defined exceptions) are based upon five-fourths of the valuation. These amendments of the finance code have gone far to stop the leakage. It is true, however, that in so far as a house property owner pays income-tax at present on a notional income which is less than his actual income, there is still some leakage, a leakage which, as I have already indicated, has to be made good to the Exchequer by taxpayers who have already paid their fair share. This Bill, I admit, will do something to remedy the injustice which this involves for citizens who have to pay tax on their full actual incomes; but is the Bill to be criticised because it remedies that injustice, for an injustice it is. Why should a man who enjoys an income from rentals be permitted to escape income-tax which his fellow-men who derive their incomes from other investments, or earn them by the use of their hands or their brains, are not permitted to escape? And, what is more, why should the property holder be permitted to escape his full share of the national burden at the expense of those who have already paid their full and true share of the national taxation? In so far as it will readjust the incidence of national taxation so that in future each income-tax payer will pay upon his true income, this is a Bill which will benefit the general mass of taxpayers.

I should like to examine this matter of income-tax a little more fully, taking first the countryside. The income of the agricultural labourer is invariably below income-tax level and nothing in this Bill can affect him so far as income-tax is concerned.

General Mulcahy

That is the agricultural labourer.

Mr. MacEntee

Yes. The vast bulk of the farmers, in fact, virtually all who live by farming, are exempt also from the tax. Broadly speaking, in so far as income-tax is paid at all by residents in rural areas, it is paid by people with businesses, professions or investments giving a non-agricultural income sufficient to bring their total incomes above the income-tax exemption mark, or by persons of the "gentleman farmer" or rancher type who have very big holdings of land. In such cases, if they are at present escaping their fair share of the income-tax because the property which they own is under-valued, they are, as I have said before, escaping it at the expense of their less fortunate neighbours. So much for the country taxpayer.

Take now the cities and towns. I have already reminded the House that since 1932, landlords receiving rent from business premises are assessed for income-tax under Schedule D upon so much of the net rent as exceeds the valuation. Where no rent is paid, or where the rent is less than the valuation, any amount by which the Schedule A assessment is too little is compensated for by the Schedule D assessment upon the business profits being so much greater. Thus, if a business man who is owner and occupier of his business premises, of which the valuation is say, £100, makes a profit of £1,000, he is at present assessed under Schedule A on £125, and under Schedule D on £875, making a total assessable income of £1,000. If the valuation of his premises goes up to £150, he will be assessed under Schedule A on £150 and, under Schedule D, on £850, again making his total of assessable income £1,000. It will be seen, therefore, that there is no loss of income-tax at present in respect of the under-valuation of business premises, and as far as business premises are concerned the new valuation will yield no increase whatever in the income-tax revenue.

That leaves for consideration non-business properties—mainly those used for residential purposes. Due to the operation of the five-fourths formula, Schedule A assessments now approach more nearly than before to the true net rent income of landlords. It may be that so far as most properties go the valuation for income-tax purposes, even with the 25 per cent. addition, is still less than the true net income derived from the property. But for any given case, the resulting extra income-tax liability under this Bill may be anything from zero to x times 4/6— assuming the standard rate of tax to remain at 4/6, and that £x is the amount over and above the 25 per cent. addition by which the present true net income exceeds the Schedule A assessment. What the precise additional liability will be depends upon the landlord's total income from all sources, and upon the amount of relief to which he is entitled by reason of his personal circumstances.

In actual fact, however, it is most unusual to-day to find an income-tax payer who derives all his income from ownership of residential property. The increase, therefore, in the income-tax liability of individual citizens will in general be negligible. Where no part of a person's total income is derived from ownership of house property, the new cadastre will not affect his income-tax liability in any way.

General Mulcahy

Or his rent?

Mr. MacEntee

Except, strictly speaking, to reduce his rent.

General Mulcahy

By what percentage?

Mr. MacEntee

That is a matter that remains to be seen, when the revaluation is complete and is in operation. It will be seen, therefore, that as between income-tax payers of the same total incomes and the same family responsibilities, the new cadastre to be prepared under this Bill will remedy the unfairness which now exists as between those of them whose incomes arise in whole or in part from ownership of residential property and those no part of whose incomes arises from such ownership. It will remedy the unfairness by placing them all on the same basis. It will remedy also the unfairness which now exists as between those who are so well-circumstanced as to be called upon to pay income-tax on income derived from house property, and that other, and by far the more numerous section of the community: those whose incomes are so small in relation to their family and other circumstances, that they can only meet their obligations to the State through the action of the indirect taxes. So much for the income-tax aspect of this Bill.

I now come to the main purpose of the Bill which, as is explained in the memorandum, is to restore rating relativity and, by this means, to ensure that the burden of rates is distributed justly among the general body of ratepayers. Other circumstances remaining the same, the effect of the revaluation in any city, town or county, is not, and cannot be, to increase the aggregate of the rate burden upon the ratepayers but, as I have said, to secure a fairer distribution of it among them.

The principle underlying rating is that in each area the cost of the local services should be divided among the ratepayers in proportion to the net annual value of the property occupied by them. If there is to be an equitable distribution of the burden, the ratio of distribution should be a ratio of the values actually existing, and not a ratio of the values as they existed or would have existed in the last century or in 1913. Now, not merely are the valuations in the present cadastre on the whole too low; but the relations which the valuations of the several hereditaments of which it is comprised bear to the true net rental values of the properties concerned are not, in fact, uniform and consistent with each other. Accordingly the cadastre is bad from the point of view of relativity as well, which means that it is unsatisfactory for the purposes of local rates.

Admittedly there is no reason to think that the cadastre, as produced in the middle of the last century, was not, as a reflex of the then true annual values of buildings, probably as good as could be obtained. But the money value of immovable property is subject, with lapse of time, to constant change. Monetary units alter in value in terms of bricks and mortar; buildings are pulled down and destroyed, the site or situation value of buildings rises or falls according as the town or city, or part of the town or city, is thriving or declining. In short, by reason of these and other changes which have taken place over 70 years, the general cadastre of our valuations has become obsolete. The memorandum which I have circulated shows how this obsolescence grew. But perhaps I had better go into the matter again.

Take the case of, say, an urban rating area other than a certain portion of Dublin City and the whole of Waterford City. In such an area, Griffith's cadastre came into force in the fifties of the last century. Probably in every year since then, the Valuation Office has been asked to revise some valuations in that area. But in any area and in any year the valuations thus revised have represented only a very small proportion of all the valuations in the cadastre. A great number of valuations in the cadastre never came up for revision at all. They remain as Griffith fixed them over 70 years ago.

Now, in the earlier years, the task of the Valuation Office in dealing with such valuations as came up for revision was straightforward enough. The properties reported annually for revision were valued on the basis laid down in Section 11 of the Valuation Act, 1852, i.e., on the basis of net letting value. But, as the nineteenth century advanced, values of property in terms of money began gradually to rise. Indeed, by 1890, the position had already arisen that if the Valuation Office valued the relatively few properties which were up for revision at the prevailing money values, the valuations of these properties would be relatively higher than the valuations of the general run of similar properties in the area. That would have meant that properties which had been sent up for revision, and revalued accordingly, would contribute more than their fair share to local rates.

To meet this crucial problem in valuation, and to preserve rating equity, the Valuation Office, with the acquiescence of the courts, evolved a practice of valuing cases before it for revision, not upon the basis of the true current money values of the properties, but on the lower basis of value at which the general run of properties in the area stood valued. This was called "making deductions to make relative." Naturally, the deduction which had to be made varied from area to area—in itself an awkward and inconvenient position. Moreover, the practice, while theoretically a fair one from the angle of rating equity—if indeed it be humanly possible to make the necessary adjustment with happy exactness —carried with it the position that valuations were being struck at figures too low to represent correctly incomes arising directly from ownership of property.

Then came the Great War. It and its aftermath had the effect of causing immovable property values in general to appreciate very greatly in terms of money. Not uniformly, of course, for the Great War brought, as well, many changes in people's habits and tastes, in business methods, in domestic arrangements and other things which had their particular reactions upon individual properties. The time, in fact, was ripe for a general revaluation of all urban property. Unfortunately, this was not undertaken. The cases reaching the Valuation Office from each area for annual revision still continued to be but a small proportion of all the properties in it, and the Valuation Office continued its practice of valuing them in relation to the general run of properties in the area. The House will appreciate what that meant, and how it reacted upon the effectiveness of the cadastre, if it considers that the properties coming under the notice of the Valuation Office had first to have their value estimated on a pre-war basis, and that then that valuation had to be fixed at 20 per cent., or whatever was thought to be the appropriate percentage, below the pre-war basis. The appropriate percentage, the "deduction to make relative," varied from year to year. It was very large at the height of the post-war inflation and decreased as the value of the £ increased. With such a cumbersome and complicated procedure, applied as it was, not to the general mass of valuations but to that small proportion of them as arose, somewhat haphazardly, in the several urban areas of the country subsequent to the general valuations, anomalies and discrepancies were bound to arise. In short, the measures taken on annual revision to preserve relativity for rating purposes did not succeed in preserving it.

It is not, in fact, possible over such a long period as 80 years, without any general revaluation, to preserve rating relativity by the process of whittling down the true values of the handful of cases that come up annually for revision. The amount of whittling down which should be done in any revision year can only be truly gauged upon a consideration of how far below true current values the general run of valuations in an area stood in that revision year. But, in fact, the actual position is this, that in any given area, in any given year, the unrevised valuations stand below those values in all sorts of different ratios.

Officers of local authorities can see and report new bricks and mortar, but urban property values, as I have said, rise and fall in value quite apart from changes in brick and mortar values. Their values may change, due to a rise or fall in situation value, which is not physically visible. And local public officers would not, and do not, as a rule, take it upon themselves to report a property for revision merely on their surmising that the situation value had changed. Consequently, 96, or perhaps more—in some cases certainly more— out of every 100 valuations throughout the country do not come under the notice of the Valuation Office for critical examination and appraisement at all upon what is somewhat misleadingly described as the annual revision. Those which do not come forward within a reasonable period of time remain unchanged, while the values of the properties to which they are attached fluctuate and change in all sorts of ways. The result is that the unrevised valuations in any area, that is, those from which the Valuation Office has to try to deduce a "deduction for relativity" for annual revision purposes, are not in themselves relative. Therefore, the unrevised valuations, we may take it, are not in themselves truly relative and the revised valuations, we may take it, are not in themselves truly relative either. But if the valuations upon which the municipal revenues are raised are not relative then, inevitably, the distribution of the rate burden among the general body of the ratepayers will be inequitable. The great merit of this Bill is that it will lead to the redress of such inequities and will ensure that every ratepayer will be assessed for rates according to the true value of his premises, that is, according to his fair share. Correspondingly, any person who is paying more than his fair share will be relieved of his unjust burden.

So much for the reactions of the general revaluation upon ratepayers in general. Let us now consider how the local authorities themselves will be affected. From their point of view also an up-to-date valuation has obvious advantages. One consequence of the general run of valuations throughout the country being much lower than the true net values of the hereditaments concerned is that the rate in the £ which the local authorities have to strike is naturally high. Another is that the impression is given to the general public that the existing indebtedness of our local authorities is excessive in proportion to their resources, as represented by the aggregate valuations of the areas they administer. Indeed, it is not too much to say that upon the facts as they now present themselves to outside observers, who are unaware of the peculiar deficiencies in our present system of valuation, the general opinion held abroad as to the solvency of most of our local authorities is distinctly unfavourable. It is a wrong view. It is not justified by the fundamental facts. It is highly detrimental, not merely to the credit of the local authorities, but to the credit of the State.

Mr. Belton

It will increase the value of the State.

General Mulcahy

It is a Defence of the Realm Act.

Mr. MacEntee

Deputy Belton is the Chairman of the Finance Committee of the Dublin Corporation and he ought to know a little about this.

Mr. Belton

We are waiting for a reply from you for a long time and you have side-tracked us.

Mr. MacEntee

I believe in people helping themselves. When they take responsibilities they ought to carry them.

Mr. Belton

I suppose this is the reply.

Mr. MacEntee

As I was saying, this erroneous view which is formed by uninformed people as to the solvency of the local authorities is highly detrimental, not merely to the credit of the local authorities, but to the credit of the State. But it is the opinion which uninformed people must form when they contrast the high indebtedness of our local areas with the very low valuation put upon the properties within those areas. The House, therefore, will easily see how high rates, low valuations and apparnetly high indebtedness of the local public bodies act as deterrents to potential lenders, and why these factors have been known to frighten off enterprising persons who were considering the establishment of new industrial concerns in certain areas.

Mr. Belton

This will give them a fright.

Mr. MacEntee

By bringing valuations into closer relation to actual current letting or rental values, particularly in the municipalities, the general revaluation will put local authorities on a sounder financial basis. This should react favourably on their credit and enable them the better to carry the burdens which the necessary social services of housing, public health, and so forth imposes. Similarly, by enabling them to reduce their rate, it should enhance the attractiveness of their areas to entrepreneurs who may be seeking favourable locations for factories and such like undertakings, and, like the increase in the aggregate valuation of their areas, it should also help their credit.

Professor O'Sullivan

Hear, hear!

Mr. MacEntee

I am glad that the Deputy agrees with me.

General Mulcahy

The Minister ought to take the subject seriously.

Mr. MacEntee

I am, but there is a certain degree of levity on the Opposition Benches which indicates that the Deputies there are not taking it seriously.

Mr. Belton

It is much better than Wicklow gold.

Mr. MacEntee

I was saying that the fact that this Bill would enable local authorities to reduce their rate would also help their credit. In turn the improvement of their credit should make it easier for them to provide those local services which are the prerequisite of industrial development to-day. In that connection I may say that it is absurd to suggest, as I have seen it suggested in some quarters, that an increase in rateable value will of itself increase the ratepayers' burden. As Deputy Belton, or any Deputy who is interested in local administration, must know, the revenue required to meet the needs of a rating area is not affected by the book value of its valuation. Whether the rateable value is or is not increased on revaluation, the actual rate burden on the general body of ratepayers should remain unchanged; any increase in the rateable value should be accompanied by a fall in the poundage rate.

Mr. Dockrell

Does that argument apply to Schedule A?

Mr. MacEntee

We are talking about rates.

A Deputy

Valuations.

Mr. MacEntee

We are not talking about taxes. I am sure the Deputy appreciates the difference. We are talking about rates at the moment and I am saying——

Mr. Hughes

It is applicable to both.

Mr. MacEntee

I have just said that the actual burden on the ratepayers after revaluation should remain unchanged, that is in the aggregate, and any increase in the rateable value should be, as I have said, accompanied by a fall in the poundage rate. Thus the effect of revaluation should be a redistribution of the rate burden. Some ratepayers admittedly will pay more, some less, than at present, and some will pay about the same, unless, of course, those who are in charge of local administration should get a fit of squandermania. Then, neither the existing valuation nor any new valuation will prevent the rates from going up I will admit that it is probably true that upon a good cadastre, such as we hope to evolve as a result of this valuation, it is easier to levy rates without hardship to ratepayers than it is to levy rates upon the basis of a bad cadastre, because, with a good cadastre, no person will be called upon to pay more than his fair share and, therefore, no person is likely to be overtaxed. I do not think that that fact can be any reason for assuming, however—as those do who seemingly oppose revaluation upon this ground—that local authorities will abuse a good cadastre to collect money needlessly from the ratepayers. I am perfectly certain that, if there were revaluation in the city to-morrow, Deputy Belton would not consent to the citizens of Dublin being needlessly bled simply because revaluation had made it easier to raise money from the citizens. I am perfectly certain that Deputy Belton, as Chairman of the Finance Committee, would be just as zealous as the Minister for Finance, not to take a penny piece more from the citizens than would be required.

Mr. Belton

You will bleed them for income-tax first.

Mr. MacEntee

The Deputy will make up for my deficiency.

Mr. Bennett

He could not do that.

Mr. MacEntee

Let me explain the position a little further. I was saying that there ought to be no reason why the total burden upon the ratepayers should be increased by reason of revaluation. But the Valuation Office has no control over the rating authority. All the Valuation Office may do is to prepare for the local authority a sound basis upon which the local authority may raise its revenues. The raising of the rate is no function of the Valuation Office. The collection of the rates is no function of the Valuation Office. The rates are raised and collected for the purpose of paying for municipal services. What those services cost depends upon the demand which the citizens make and their cost will have to be provided, in any event, whether the cadastre of valuation be good or bad. It does not matter whether it be at the rate of 20/- in the £, or perhaps more levied upon a bad and false valuation, or at the rate of 13/- or so in the £ upon a good and true valuation. The ratepayers, in the aggregate, will have to pay the same, dependent upon the services which the local authority provides for them. The only difference, in fact, is that in the first case, that is where a high rate is levied upon a bad valuation, very many citizens will be called upon to pay too much. In the second case, that is where a reasonable rate or a low rate is levied upon a good valuation, no one has to pay more than his just share.

In the counties, outside the urban areas, the effect of revaluation upon the farmer should be to lighten his aggregate rate burden. The extent to which it will be lightened will probably be more appreciable in those counties with large urban areas, contributing to poor relief expenses and other joint county charges. The same applies, generally, to the case of the agricultural labourer.

I think I have shown that general revaluation of the country will be in the interests of the general body of ratepayers and also of the local authority. I do not think it is necessary for me to deal with the provisions of the Bill itself. They have been dealt with at fairly great length in the explanatory memorandum and any further lengthy exposition of them seems to be unnecessary. If, however, any Deputy desires information on any point, which I have not fully covered either now or in the memorandum, I shall be happy to reply to him when closing the debate on this stage, if the information is available. I shall be only too glad to consider any suggestion which Deputies may desire to make for improvement of the Bill. I should perhaps, however, remind the House that, as the explanatory memorandum sets out, the Bill in general follows, in its administrative and judicial arrangements, the lines of the existing valuation code and the general rule of valuation, as set out in Section 19 (k)—namely, net annual rental value—is the same basis as that prescribed in the Valuation Act, 1852, for the initial general revaluation of the country. The only important innovation is that contained in Section 15 (1) (g) whereby the Commissioner of Valuation is given the power to initiate annual revisions. By that expedient it is hoped, without any provision for periodical general valuations, to prevent the new cadastre when made, from becoming obsolete in time.

I should also like to point out to the House and to emphasise that on the enactment of this Bill consequential legislation will be necessary in connection with a number of matters. The last paragraph of the memorandum explanatory of the Bill touches upon three of those, but certain other matters, such as publicans' licence duties, will also fall to be covered by fresh legislation. In addition there will be some minor matters to be regulated, probably in a future Finance Bill. I should also like to emphasise that this Bill is merely a Bill to enable the rates in general and certain restricted classes of taxation to be levied equitably upon those who in justice ought to pay them. It is not intended to interfere with the existing housing code, or rent restrictions code, or any of those matters. As a result of this Bill, which is very much overdue, certain consequential amendments will have to be made.

Mr. Fitzgerald-Kenney

When does the Minister propose to bring in the Consequential Amendments Bill?

Mr. MacEntee

Before any part of the new cadastre comes into operation.

Mr. Fitzgerald-Kenney

That is within the next year?

Mr. MacEntee

The new cadastre will not come into operation even in the county boroughs for about four years. Before that time the necessary amending legislation will be before the House.

Mr. Corish

How will the charges for services be dealt with?

Mr. MacEntee

I was coming to that. Where charges for services, such as electricity charges, are related to the valuation, revision of the charges will be called for when the new cadastre is coming into force in any area. This however, in so far as electricity charges are concerned, will be a matter capable of simple and direct adjustment, and it is not likely that new legislation will be necessary to enable the adjustments to be made. It has been suggested that this Bill might deter farmers from improving their houses. The purpose and policy of the Government is to provide decent housing for all the people in the cities, in the urban areas, and in the rural areas. I can say quite clearly that this Bill will not be allowed to hold up or impede Government policy in that regard. As in the case of the housing code and other matters, consequential amendments to existing statutes will be made in the appropriate Bills at the appropriate time, but certainly before the cadastre is applied to any particular area.

Mr. Corish

Has the Minister any idea how long it will take to carry out the revaluation?

Mr. MacEntee

I have indicated that for the five principal centres of population in the country it will take, perhaps four or perhaps five years. It is impossible to estimate with any accuracy, but it will certainly take some such time. We may assume, I think, that the general revaluation of the country will not be completed for at least seven years from the date upon which the Valuation Office will get going.

I should like to say in conclusion that the proposal contained in this Bill for a general revaluation of buildings is no new proposal. It is not a device —as has been alleged by certain vested interests who have ranged themselves in advance against this Bill—to collect additional revenue for our Exchequer. It is a proposal which emerged, so far back as 1902, as the fruit of a long and searching investigation into local taxation in Ireland. The then commissioner of valuation stated to the commission appointed to inquire into that matter that in his view a general re-valuation was the only remedy for the unsatisfactory state of affairs even then obtaining in this country. The commission endorsed that statement. They went further. They added an expression of their strong conviction that it was "not easy to exaggerate the importance of fair, uniform and accurate valuation as a preliminary to any just distribution of the burdens of local administration".

We have heard a great deal in this House from time to time about the burdens which the State is imposing upon local authorities. Before that question can be accurately and definitively investigated it is necessary that we should have a general revaluation of the country. Otherwise, any recommendations which may be made will have no solid substance behind them. As I say, and as the commission said, a fair, uniform and accurate valuation is a necessary preliminary to any just distribution of the burdens of local administration. Unfortunately for the finances of the local authorities to-day, and for the general body of their ratepayers, that recommendation was not acted upon. In proposing to give effect to it in this Bill I am merely asking the House to remedy a position that should have been remedied half a century ago, and which has been greatly aggravated by the passage of time.

Mr. Belton

I should like to ask the Minister if it is his intention to abolish the added 25 per cent. under Schedule A.

Mr. MacEntee

Yes.

Mr. Belton

And to restore the one-sixth for repairs?

Mr. MacEntee

That is another

Mr. Belton

The reason given by the Minister when he abolished this one-sixth and added the 25 per cent. was the too low valuation of property.

Mr. Cosgrave

If one were to judge by the very bored expressions of the Deputies supporting the Minister on this measure during his statement, one would say that the measure had been approved by the Party with reluctance. The Minister made a fairly long statement with regard to the case for this measure. The case would appear to have been put up by experts, and it is on a par with most of what can be read in connection with reports of commissions upon questions of valuation during the last 30 or 40 years. It may, however, be of interest to the House to know that this question of revaluation was considered in Northern Ireland as early as 1923. It was submitted to a departmental commission—not perhaps the most favourable kind of commission that might consider it, because it was composed principally of officials of the various Departments of State in the service of the Northern Government. They brought in a report giving, to the best of their judgment and opinion the steps that should be taken to deal with those anomalies that have been mentioned by the Minister, those cases in which there were revised and unrevised valuations, and various other things, but there was one point they stressed more than another, that they had at that time in Northern Ireland reached the peak of local as well as national taxation. It was refreshing to read that coming from a number of officials. If it had come from a number of business people, or from persons who were taxed, whether they like it or not, it might not have the same force. There were other commissions dealing with the same subject, until eventually a Bill was introduced in the Northern Parliament for revaluation, and the case made for it there was that it was by no means a voluntary action on the part of the Government, that, as far as they were concerned, if they had their choice they would not introduce it. There were good reasons, they thought, for coming to that decision.

It would appear, if one were closely to examine and analyse the statement of the Minister in connection with this case, that he indicted the Valuation Office. The revised valuations are wrong, the unrevised valuations are wrong, everything would appear to be wrong, notwithstanding the fact that he has said that something like four per cent. of the valuations fall for consideration every year. If that has gone on for a period of something like 80 years, at least half the valuations must have come under consideration during that period. Perhaps much less than half of the original valuations made in 1852 or 1855 stand at the old figure. The case to be made for this Bill is of importance, but it should be flanked by proofs of injustice, of such a character, and such number, as would warrant the revaluation of the country. This is an unexpected measure. That point is as important as the one made by the Minister, that the natural or regular revision of valuations should take place. If, over a period of 40 or 50 years, property comes on the market and is purchased, according to the lease, the valuation, and the condition of the property, and if people buy it with their eyes open, it is nonsense to say that those who bought it, no matter how much it has increased in value, have not paid a fair share. They bought it in the open market at the highest price at which it could be bought, and it is those from whom they bought have escaped, by reason of the low valuation put on such property.

Now, this measure proposes to deal with any inequality, and to tax those who paid the full price, whereas the persons who got the advantage have possibly left the country or gone to some other place. There are two questions involved in this measure, (1) the case for the Bill; (2), whether this is the time for it. The overriding decision of all is: Are the proposals in the Bill to deal with re-valuation equitable? Is the Bill itself an equitable Bill? Is it fair to the people? Will its passage do more harm than good, in so far as the general condition of employment in the country is concerned? My impression, for what it is worth, is that this measure is likely to have a very unsettling effect upon business and employment, generally. Looking over the returns of the national income it is quite clear that our national income has declined, and has been declining for some years. The revenue from our external investments has fallen, and is likely to fall. I do not make that as a mere prophetic statement, but, rather, having regard to the trend of events and, if I might add, following a speech I read recently which was made by some member of the Ministry on the subject.

The sums of money employed, either in purchasing Saving Certificates or lodged in the post office, show considerable contraction during the last twelve months. The general report amongst business people is that at Christmas, 1938, business was not up to the usual standard, and that there has been no improvement since that date. The number of persons engaged in agricultural employment has diminished in the last few years. It is in such circumstances that we have to consider this measure, because, if we are to interpret what the Minister stated, there is no doubt whatever but the re-valuation of this country is going to be increased by anything from 30 to 75 per cent. over the present quotation.

I do not at all subscribe to the thesis of the Minister, that big valuations are an advantage to a municipality or a local authority, or that they add to their credit. What stands to the credit of a local authority is its efficient management, the fact that it meets its liabilities when they arise, and that its business is done according to the accepted canons of public administration. One could multiply the valuation of any given place by the stroke of a pen, but that does not add to the wealth of the local authority. It might be misleading, and, in these matters of credit and credit worthiness, anything which tends to mislead is always looked upon with suspicion. According to the terms of the section in this measure dealing with valuations, which the Minister told us are the same as those embodied in the original Valuation Act, the cadastre has to be considered according to the net annual value. But there is more than that in it. There is one particular clause of Section 19 which states that should a person be in occupation of premises, at a higher rent than would be paid for it by any other person, the rent being paid is to be regarded as the net annual rent.

In other words, there are four houses together let at £20 a year; one man wants a house and he is prepared to pay £30 for it and he goes into it at £30. According to this measure the net annual value of that house is £10 more than any of the others. If we are to have an equitable consideration of this matter we have got to consider whether it is the individual that we are going to value or the house. If it be the house, then the net annual value of the house is what should be considered and not what some particular person would pay for it.

We must take into account in this matter of net annual value what change has taken place in this country during the last 20 years. Twenty or 25 years ago it was possible to acquire a house at a rent without much difficulty. The majority of the houses were let at rents. Since that period, quite a different situation has arisen and people now have to buy their houses or negotiate in connection with the sale of a house. They are not usually held at a rental. They are purchased either through an insurance company, building society, a bank, or cash down, as the case may be. In any case, the old system which was in operation in the country generally pre-war has been modified to a very considerable extent during the last few years. In that connection, we cannot ignore that there is a special reference in this White Paper to what is called bricks and mortar. Presumably, the intention was to include everything which goes towards the building of a house. It would appear from some recent correspondence between the Manager of the City of Dublin and his committees that one of the objections that were raised by people who were asked to underwrite a loan for the Corporation was that the cost of building in the city was 40 per cent. over what it was in England.

Let us examine that. I find that for the last two years, 1937 and 1938, there was collected in customs duty on cement and other items of building requisites of one kind or another over £120,000. I find on looking up the Estimates or the Appropriation Accounts, as the case may be, that there was a sum of over £440,000 paid, I think it was last year, either as subsidies or as part of the loan charges of the local authority. It is quite clear, according to that, that if the cost of building construction is to be considered in relation not only to the cost of the materials but also to the taxes that have been imposed on them or, alternatively, or along with that, if the money that has to be put up by the State in order to get those houses built has to be considered as an annual value, we are not going to get an equitable figure in connection with the value of the property.

Let us take building construction for the year 1937. Building construction and new constructional work on buildings cost £4,200,000. It was £500,000 for the previous year and in that there was £124,000 customs duties on cement, cement blocks, clay pipes, tiles, asbestos, builders' metal works, glass, bolts, iron, paints and distempers, woods and manufactures thereof and, along with that, a sum of £441,000 was paid as the Government's contribution towards the loan charges of local authorities in constructing houses for the working classes. I wonder if it is proposed, in connection with the administration of this particular Bill, that these items and corresponding items, which inflate the cost of building construction, are going to be deducted when they are making an equitable and correct cadastre for the future or are we to take it that in order to get prospective lenders to local authorities we have got to swell our valuations and place them beyond what they are worth? I submit that in connection with that particular clause in this measure the House is entitled and the country is entitled to a more detailed and lucid explanation of what is meant before it should pass.

We are warned in connection with the Report of the Banking Commission that we have got to be careful about the balance of payments, which includes, amongst other things, our adverse balance and so on. Very many people profess to know nothing whatever about those things. A very large number say they know nothing about finance, that it frightens them. Some say they know nothing about currency and so on. The fact of the matter is that they need not know anything about it at all to understand what is meant by the balance of payments. The position we are in in this country is that there is now almost general agreement amongst all the people in it that if we are to prosper we must export agricultural goods or some goods, that we must sell in foreign markets. Those banal things we used to hear of, self-sufficiency and independence of foreign markets have all gone by the board. We have got to get money in from some source, either for the goods we sell or on the investments we have outside. As our investments outside are diminishing, it is all the more important that our exports should increase. One of the things that is going to operate against increasing our exports is the cost of production. The cost incidental to the marketing of our production and everything which militates against economic production in the country are going to prevent us getting in that money which we must have if we are going to import the things we cannot do without and which no prohibition, quotas, licences, or tariffs, have prevented from coming into this country.

Let us examine the sums of money which have had to be provided during the last few years for the Government's contribution towards rates throughout the country—"Government bounty in lieu of rates," is the description which appears in our Estimates—in essence what it means is the sum of money due and paid by the Government on property which they are in occupation of to the various local authorities in whose area that property is situate. The sum paid in respect of that sort of property in 1930-31 was £78,000 and the sum provided in the Estimate of last year is £115,000. There is a very considerable rise in that expenditure and that is one of the matters which, I am quite sure, the members of the Banking Commission had in mind when they drew attention to the rising costs of local as well as national administration.

In one of the clauses of this measure it transpires that it is open to the Commissioner of Valuation not to bother his head about valuing Government property. It is some time ago since I read it, and the Minister can correct me if I am making any mistake. How it is proposed in future to deal with Government bounty in lieu of rates puzzles me if the Government property is not valued the same as anybody else's.

There is one peculiarity about this measure from A to Z, that it seems to provide every possible security and facility for the Government and its various departments to get whatever information they want, to impose penalties if they do not get it, and to let them out of any difficulties into which they wish to put other people, while, at the same time, imposing penalties in respect of individuals if they do not give information when asked, and other things of that sort. One of the recommendations for this measure, according to what we have heard this evening, is that in the valuation the cities and towns will unquestionably go up in valuation, and that, in consequence of that rise in valuation, the weight of taxation falling upon farmers will be much less.

Mr. MacEntee

The Deputy is carrying my words much further than they went.

Mr. Cosgrave

I do not want to do it. I will put it in another way. It is expected that there will be an increase in the valuation in cities. It is not expected that there will be an increase in the valuation of farmers' houses and buildings. In consequence, it may be hoped that the weight of rates will not fall so heavily upon farmers. Is that correct?

Mr. MacEntee

I do not think so.

Mr. Cosgrave

I will not go any further in trying to find out what was meant.

Mr. MacEntee

I will correct the Deputy when replying.

Mr. Cosgrave

We will leave it so. According to the Bill, unless I am mistaken, farmhouses and buildings fall for consideration in the new cadastre and will be revalued. Some German was over here some years ago and he considered our agricultural economy. When asked what he thought about it, he said that he thought that we were a very extravagant people. When asked why, he said: "Your particular output over here is cattle. It is the only country in the world that I know of where cattle are fed in the winter on the dearest possible diet.""What was that?" he was asked, and he replied: "Beefsteak."

It seems a very foolish sort of statement, but the fact is that the cattle were allowed to live during that period on their own fat rather than getting the treatment they got on the Continent. One of the ways in which it is possible to help the feeding of stock in the winter is to have houses for them. If one took the big view with regard to production and if one took the easy view with regard to production, it would be of advantage in this country to help the farmers to construct buildings and not to rate them at all, the object being to get a bigger production, to get it at the least possible cost, and to add to the wealth of the country.

I do not know whether any Deputies waste their time listening to the radio. There was an account given by somebody from the North of Ireland the other night on the radio in which he stated that they had taken an account of 11 farms in five or six counties in Northern Ireland. The farms varied in size from 24 to 130 acres. They were from every county in the North of Ireland but one— Fermanagh. He gave the weekly average income of these six farms. I give these particular figures for the reason that they had not the disturbance which occurred down here from 1932 to 1938 and, generally speaking, every effort was made to improve agricultural production and so on up there. Fairly good evidence of that fact will be found in some publications by the Ministry of Agriculture of Northern Ireland. The Ministry of Agriculture in their report on page 5 of the Eleventh General Report state:—

"The value of the net output of Northern Ireland farms fell from £11,300,000 in 1924-25 to £9,500,000 in 1931."

In another report on wages and employment they state in paragraph 36, page 23:-

"It is estimated by the Ministry of Agriculture that the value of the gross output of the industry has increased from £10,380,000 in 1932-33 to £16,116,000 in 1936-7."

It will be observed that there is a very considerable increase there — over 50 per cent. The average weekly income in respect of these farms amounted to a fraction over £2 per week, probably 1/- or 2/-. I missed one figure, and if it were the figure I think it was, the average would be £2 3s. One year it only amounted to 9s. 9d. weekly. It would be rather interesting for us in this country, in view of the circumstances of the last few years, to get correct figures for a corresponding number of farms. The gentleman who was broadcasting mentioned that it was not any wonder the land was losing its attraction for the people.

This measure will revalue farmers' homesteads and the farm buildings and where reconstruction has taken place it will be revalued. Allowances may be made of one kind or another, but if we go back to the Minister's main theme, which was equity, and if we go on an equitable basis they fall for consideration. Can it be done, bearing in mind the income? Is it possible for them to bear any additional charge or is it possible for the country, having regard to what I have said, with the fall in its income, to bear additional charges for income tax? If the present valuation on buildings, which is something like £3,600,000, goes up to £5,000,000, are we not humbugging ourselves by assuming we have an income that we have not got at all? Does it not follow that many people who, during the last 15 or 20 years had to take houses, and as they could not get them to rent, had to put money into them, are now going to be told that their income in respect of them is worth £30 or £40, when for a number of years it was only £10, £15 or £20, as the case may be? If our principal source of wealth is agriculture, and we bear in mind the weekly income to which I have referred, what prospect is there of getting any more out of it, when everybody's thoughts ought to be directed to improving agricultural production, lessening the costs incidental to that production, improving methods, and helping those engaged in it, instead of endeavouring to make it still more difficult for them by adding to their burdens and increasing the valuation? In one of those cases reported in one of the best books written on the question of valuation it was announced from the Bench on one occasion that if Dublin were properly revalued—and the rates were then 10s. 6d. in the £—the rates would amount to only 5/- in the £; that there would be a reduction, by reason of the extraordinary increase in valuation, in the rates from 10/6 to 5/-. What happened? It was revalued, according to the Minister, on the 1913 basis, and it was sent up about 11 per cent. in its valuation. Ask any business man in the City of Dublin or the City of Cork whether or not those big establishments that are giving employment to hundreds of people are making money. From my observation of their balance sheets in the last few years, the thing that puzzles me is how long they are going to go on, and they are the big-rated businesses in both Dublin and Cork. Take their employees, and they are as much a part of the machinery of business as the big places themselves. Their employees live in houses valued, say, for £20, £24, or perhaps even £30. If the business is not doing well, there may be reductions in salaries—and there have been no increases in salaries in recent years—and now, with a stroke of the pen, a man living in a house that was valued for £20 about 20 years ago is going to have the valuation raised to £30 or £40 and his income is going to be assumed to be about 20 per cent. more than it was 20 years ago, but although he may be earning more money, if business is decreasing, there is always the possibility of unemployment and his chances of obtaining employment are very much less than what they were.

One of the provisions in connection with this Act is that, if there is a garden attached to a house that does not serve the purpose of producing mangolds, wheat, or something of that sort—if it is merely ornamental—it is to be regarded as a luxury, and the valuation is to go up in consequence. I wonder if those who put down that particular clause took into consideration what the incidence of employment is amongst gardeners during the last ten or fifteen years. Fifteen or twenty years ago it was a fine occupation, and there were good gardeners around such places as Dublin, Cork, Waterford, and so on. Inquire now what is the employment amongst them, and if, by reason of an increase in valuation, the gardener loses his employment for two or three days in a week, or for a week, or for a year, are we going to be much better off by reason of our boast that the valuation of our municipality has gone up by £500,000 if the numbers of unemployed have increased at the same time? And it is in order to settle these inequalities and anomalies and other extraordinary things that have been allowed to grow up during the last 50 or 60 years that we are to disturb everybody's mind, to set a new establishment in motion with extra officials employed. One would imagine that when the traffic of a place is increasing, it is a sign of business when extra policemen are put on point duty in order to regulate it. What is the cost going to be? Very moderate— 2½ d. in the £, and two-fifths of a penny in the £ for the future. Take the case of an artisan who is living in a house valued for about £12. He will pay 2/6 down, and if he lives long enough —and the usual length of time, I suppose, will be about 25 years—he will pay 10/- during those 25 years—12/6 altogether. That is not a whole lot. I think it will be found that only about 93 per cent. of the rates are collected, and we will have to add 7 per cent. for non-collection and about 5 per cent. for the cost of collection. That is another 1/6 on, or 14/- that we are to ask this unfortunate artisan to pay, in order to settle a dispute between Herr von Ribbenthrop, up there in Grafton Street, and his neighbour, some other Herr, who are well able to settle any disputes that may be between them over a matter of £5 or £10 a year, one way or the other.

We were promised, in 1913 or 1914, in connection with the revaluation of Dublin, that it was going to solve everything, but it solved nothing, and it cost plenty. What is this going to cost? About £50,000 at first, if the valuation of the country is about £5,000,000, and it will cost about five times that making up the bill— £250,000 to settle disputes. It is a dear bill to establish an equitable cadastre. I wonder does the Minister look up what the Oxford Dictionary says about that particular new word that has been coined. If not, I think he would be wise to do so.

This Bill, in my opinion, is not a suitable Bill for this country. Revaluation, in a place like England, a country that has shown an enormous expansion for the last 100 years and which may, for all we know, be still expanding, may be all right. It is one thing for a country like that to have a regular quinquennial or any other sort of revaluation. If there were prospects of an expansion in this country in its output, its business enterprise and in its employment and the prosperity of its people, there would be a case for revaluation. There is not such. As things are, we can settle between ourselves that, if somebody is not paying enough, he can salve his conscience by realising that somebody else is paying too much. I suggest that the Minister might consider the arrangement that was made in the North of Ireland, and that was that there should be something in connection with new buildings such as about 15 per cent. valuation over that of the old. I do not think the time is ripe for this measure, nor do I think that the proposals embodied in the Bill are equitable. I do not think there was a case made for the Bill and I am satisfied that it is not a good Bill and should be rejected. An opportunity was afforded in connection with the introduction of this measure to codify the law regarding it. It has not been done, and we have parts of one Act and parts of another Act. It is interesting to notice that every precaution and security is given to officials right through this measure, but what is the position of a man who disputes his valuation? He goes to court. First of all, he goes to the commissioner. The commissioner may order another official to review that case, and the official may make a recommendation changing the valuation. The commissioner may reject it. The man decides to go to court. So he can, if he has got time to enter a recognisance in the matter of about £5. He goes into court, and other people may be affected and may come in and give evidence. The court can decide against all of them and give costs against anybody the court pleases. A local authority wants to appeal——

Mr. MacEntee

Is the Deputy challenging the justice of the court?

Mr. Cosgrave

No, but I am challenging all that bosh. That is not equity or justice. It is neither one nor the other.

Mr. MacEntee

The Deputy is reflecting upon the judiciary.

Mr. Cosgrave

I say that if a man goes into court he is entitled either to win or lose his case. I do not see what justification there is for his going into court losing his case and getting some other person to pay the expenses in connection with it. I do not see any justification for that. But that is the position under this Bill. The courts will distribute justice according to what is before them. A local authority can appeal from it with the permission of the Minister for Local Government and Public Health and pay its own expenses. This Bill is a Bill to get more money for income-tax and to give trouble in the country. The conditions under the Bill will give annoyance and dissatisfaction to the entire community. It is a bad Bill and one which should not be passed.

Professor O'Sullivan

I confess at the start, that we have had one advantage as far as this Bill is concerned. We have had on this Bill what we do not have on the Second Readings of other Bills; we have had two Second Reading speeches, one printed, if I may use that phrase, in a White Paper, and the other the Minister's Second Reading speech. I think this has set up a very useful precedent. It helps very largely to concentrate attention on the principal points of the Bill or perhaps I should more correctly say, on what the Department of Finance and the Minister would like the House to think are the principal parts of the Bill. That is extremely useful and I hope that a similar practice will be followed. For instance we have Estimates presented to this House and one Minister particularly who has a high place in the Government never deigns to explain his Estimates. The only explanation is in the concluding speech. Here luckily we have a different principle established and I hope it will be widely followed, especially when technical Bills are being dealt with.

I might say one other thing in connection with this valuable White Paper. There are in it some rare, precious words that must have given delight to the Minister who likes to use precious words, as we who have listened to his Budget speeches know. In this White Paper we have such words as "cadastre", "relativity" and "irrelativity". Such words running through this White Paper must rejoice the heart of any person interested in new literature. The thing—the presentation of the case in the White Paper— has been skilfully done. I readily admit that the White Paper is a remarkably good piece of special pleading. Remember official documents are generally accepted more readily at their face value than ministerial statements. From the very fact that they are printed and are official they have an air of impartiality that one could hardly expect from a Minister in his Second Reading speech.

Therefore a White Paper of this kind that sets out to pretend that the main purpose of this Bill is to restore "relativity" and get rid of "irrelativity" is very important from the Minister's point of view. It sets out that the main purpose of the Bill is, in ordinary language, to promote justice between man and man, between citizen and citizen, as an ordinary person, like myself, would put it. That that is the main purpose of the Bill is very cleverly indicated—even claimed—in the White Paper. There were a couple of passages in the speeches of the Minister where he, possibly unwisely, went a bit beyond the White Paper, that is when he was dealing with the fact that this Bill would not create any increase in the actual amount of rates paid by the individual. That followed immediately after he had pointed out to the local authorities that this Bill would enable them to increase their borrowing powers. "It is a Bill," he said, "that will enable the local authorities to borrow more money and enable them to undertake much more than at present." In the next sentence he pointed out that there is no necessity for an increase in the rates so far as this Bill is concerned. But the Minister positively gave the show away when he spoke of increasing the borrowing powers and spending powers of the local authorities. Surely that will put up the rates.

What I object to in the Bill is its insidious character. Officially and theoretically I admit this can be represented as a mere book-keeping transaction—and it might be so if you are dealing with ciphers and pawns, rather than with human beings subject to the ordinary human emotions. That is the way the official mind looks at it.

The best thing to be said for this Bill is that the aesthetic sense of the official mind will no longer be upset by the disorder, as it considers it, among the ratepaying community. That mind decided to remedy this alleged evil in this Napoleonic way. But the officials paid no attention to its effect on the ordinary local authorities and the taxpaying community. The ratepaying community that is accustomed to pay 19/6 in the £ in rates may, when it wakes up in the morning, find that it is only asked to pay 10/- in the £. These two figures will come to the same thing we are told. But the temptation will be there, if the rates are only 10/- in the £, to put on an extra 2/- and the community which has, one year after another, year in year out, been paying 19/6 in the £, may think the burden has been lightened. What is an extra 2/- when the rates are down to 10/- in the £? This will also undoubtedly have a psychological effect on the spending body. The local authority and the ratepayers after a while will find that they will have to collect or pay much more than before. But because it is 12/- in the £ instead of 19/6. they may possibly think they are getting off well.

The Government have had a little practice with that sort of thing. We all remember a couple of years ago when the community was getting impatient because a certain sum was being levied off them in taxes, the Government said: "We will levy the same money in future but we will not call it taxes. We will pass it on to the consumer in flour and sugar and let others—the manufacturers collect it." In that way you have got a number of concealed taxes. These never appear in the Budget and, unfortunately, the taxpaper has no idea what he is paying. We shall have the same thing now. The Minister solaces himself with a feeling that it will work out satisfactorily for him.

The Vice-President, or as he is called now the Tánaiste, went down recently to one of our cities that is marked out for discrimination under this Bill. He went down to Limerick and he said to the people there that the rates are not high enough. Well, here is a Bill under which the Minister for Local Government and Public Health can have his ambition satisfied. The rates can mount high enough with its help. One of the results of this Bill is that it will lead to increased expenditure when everbody knows there should not be increased expenditure owing to the depression amongst the agricultural community and in the towns and to the decrease in national revenue. For these reasons the Minister ought aim at bringing about the opposite state of things in the country—a bias not in favour but against spending.

The Minister in his Second Reading speech did not refrain from waving the national banner once more. He practically said here is a Bill that is going to confer benefits on everybody. He said it was going to level anomalies between man and man, increase the credit of the local authorities, give them opportunities to develop and expand valuable social services, get them over all the difficulties they have at present, and, above all, increase the national prestige financially. Where? Here in this country where the money is provided for this sort of thing? Not at all, but "abroad"—in Japan and in the United States this Bill will raise our credit to heights hitherto undreamt of. And how can anybody oppose it when the national flag was waved so vigorously by the Minister.

This is a Bill to confer benefits on everybody and yet nobody wants it. It is extraordinary the blindness of the community, of people suffering injustice year after year, that they do not cry out against it and call for the remedies proposed in this Bill. On the contrary they cry out against this Bill —it is not the vested interests that cry out. The very people who are supposed to be benefited cry out against it. Some of the local authorities instruct their representatives, independent of Party affiliations and loyalties —I wonder what the effect will be—to oppose this Bill, because those unfortunate people down the country think this is a new method to increase taxation. "Think"? They know perfectly well that that is the main purpose, and that all the talk about relativity and irrelativity is a smoke-screen, behind which the advance is to be to higher taxation, local or central. I understand it is not any longer "taxes". The Minister made that quite clear. Suppose we call the taxes central rates and the local rates taxes. I do not know what the difference will be because they have to be paid anyhow. This, as I was saying, is a smoke-screen behind which there can be piled on the country further taxation in the hope that the country will not notice it. Is not that the main purpose? What other purpose does anyone think there is.

We gather that there is irrelativity, but why is there? I understand that a man can go before the Valuation Department and get his house, shall we say revalued, and it will be revalued with reference to other houses in the same neighbourhood. If a man thinks that the valuation put on his house is not a fair one when considered in reference to the valuation on his neighbour's house, he can under the present law, appeal.

Have we any indication as to what the provisions of this Bill may mean in the way of increased valuations? In the very valuable White Paper circulated with the Bill there is only one indication given. It does not mention all the reasons which may lead to an increased valuation being put on a house, but it does mention this one. Paragraph 14 states:

"In the case of large numbers of new buildings which have been built since 1923, inasmuch as the structure could have been built in 1913 for about half the cost, the valuation, on a 1913 level of value, tended to work out at about 50 per cent. of the true current net letting value, with the result that every such new building tended to have its valuation fixed at a level even more irrelatively low as compared with older property than that of property A referred to in paragraph (12)."

Fifty per cent.! That is only a hint. Thus we can at least look out for a doubling of valuations. The Minister, I suppose, will say "Wait and see". All that I am saying is that that is the principal indication that we have got of what is likely to result. There are very many other reasons that may send up valuations. There is the letting value which may be much higher than the cost of building a house, because certain types of houses of low valuations have a relatively higher rental than big houses, the reason being that there is a bigger demand for them. Everybody knows that it is much more difficult to get a small house than it is to get a much bigger house on account of the demand. What then is to be the result? That people who built their houses, or bought them, on the deferred payment plan are to have the value of their houses doubled with their rates increasing probably year by year as the inevitable result of this Bill.

Look at the position that threatens the country. The system that has grown up in this country in connection with houses, and with many things appertaining to houses—the system of deferred payments and payments by instalments—is an exceedingly dangerous system. It means that a young man, when starting his life as the head of a family, has to get a house, has to pay down so much and agree to pay back the loan by instalments. He is thereby mortgaging his whole future at a time when, of course, the full costs of family life are not yet on him, and he is doing that not merely for the house but also for his furniture and for various other things in the house. Everybody must see the inherent dangers in that system, and now the Government are going to add on to them increased valuations just to satisfy the aesthetic requirements, the mathematical requirements, of officialdom. You are going to try to help to bring about more quickly and surely the catastrophe to which this system of deferred payments tends anyhow.

The main purpose of the Bill is, as I say, to secure by a back door a better opportunity for what the Minister in his speech has just called squandermania, at a time when, instead of opening doors to anything of the kind, it should be the business of a responsible Minister for Finance to put up warnings against anything of the kind. But instead of putting up these warnings he is doing the very opposite. And this is the Minister who appointed the Banking Commission on which there may have been a few "misguided and misinformed" foreigners. It surely should be the business of the man who appointed that commission to spread broadcast the warnings of which I have spoken. What is the aim? I cannot see that it is the alleged aim of settling differences between one man and another. That could have been done without this particular Bill if individuals were alive to their interests and if the Valuation Office were to act on the principles that it says it is acting on.

The Minister said that this Bill would benefit local authorities. The White Paper not merely once but at least twice points out that local authorities, except one or two, up to the present have never availed themselves of the opportunity of getting their districts revalued. For 60 years and more that opportunity has been in the hands of the local authorities and they have never availed of it. Why, if the benefits to them are as clear as pointed out by the Minister for Finance, have only one or two of them brought an appeal for 60 years? Remember that with the rapid change in the value of money, it is quite obvious that the cadastre of valuation will be well out of date in ten years, but then there is to be continuous general revaluation. That is one of the things to be remembered about this Bill: that this is not a revaluation and a disturbance for one period: it is to be a continuous disturbance right through. That is one of the advantages claimed for the provisions of this Bill. Not merely will there be disturbance and uncertainty produced by one general valuation, but after the seven years' work is done the good work starts again, and there is to be what the Minister's friend, Trotsky, would call "continuous revolution."

So far as the ratepayers are concerned, this is a kind of summer-time Bill. We know the difficulty of getting up an hour earlier in summer than in winter, but everybody knows what a great advantage it is. Therefore, the people had to be fooled into it. Everybody said: "What is the use of the Summer-time Act? There is no necessity for it." If a man simply says: "I will get up at 6 o'clock instead of 7 o'clock, why the legislation?" but everybody knows that as a result of introducing the Summer-time Bill, the great bulk of the people actually did get up an hour earlier. The Minister may tell the House, if it is simple enough to believe him, that this Bill need lead to no increase in taxation, local or otherwise; but everybody who knows human nature knows perfectly well that that will be the direct effect of it. I am convinced that that is the purpose of it and I think that was revealed in the speech of the Minister. He let that slip out when he became eloquent. So long as he kept to the written word, he was safe. It was only when he trusted his eloquence that we had the real situation revealed to us, that this is a Bill to secure further taxation and to slip it through unnoticed.

Mr. Moore

Are the local authorities against it?

Mr. Morrissey

Did they ask for it?

Professor O'Sullivan

I shall be quite ready to listen to Deputy Moore when he has the opportunity to put before the House a list of the local authorities that called for this measure. The Deputy, I see, accepts the challenge. Amazing that the Minister should have concealed that fact which would have told so strongly in his favour. If the Deputy has such a list of enthusiastic supporters of the Bill among local authorities perhaps he would give it to the Minister so that he may give it to the House, when replying. I know that Deputy Moore follows the newspapers much more closely than I do, but all the references that I have seen to this Bill by any local authorities are against it. For 60 or 70 years, the local authorities did not understand the great benefits they could have got by applying to the Valuation Office for a revaluation of each county, but now we are told that they are positively gasping for the Bill.

Mr. Moore

I thought I heard the Deputy describe how delightfully the local authorities would avail of the temptation afforded by it to increase taxation?

Professor O'Sullivan

Well?

Mr. Moore

That does not seem to be consistent, does it?

Professor O'Sullivan

I cannot help it if the local authorities behave in that way.

Mr. MacEntee

The Deputy cannot help being inconsistent.

Professor O'Sullivan

I am not inconsistent. That the local authorities who are opposed to this Bill will fall into the temptation to increase taxation, once the Bill is passed. That is an entirely different proposition. They are opposed to the Bill because before that temptation is put in their way, they know the result of it. Even a local authority that calmly beforehand does not consider it advisable to increase taxation for its county or town may when the temptation is there, as the Deputy must know perfectly well, `yield to that temptation and will be urged or forced by the Government to do so.

While I am on the question of demand for the Bill, there is an unaccustomed note of generosity and mildness struck in paragraph 34 of this White Paper. One of the reasons given for the exemption of agricultural land is:—

"... that farmers in general would prefer to abide by Griffith's Valuation of their land, to which they have been so long accustomed than to have a revaluation of the land..."

There is a mercy which for the moment tempered the Ministerial and the official heart. Why is there not the same mercy and gentleness in respect of other members of the community?

Would the great bulk of the community not prefer to remain as they are at present? Has there been, not merely on the part of local authorities, but on the part of the public, or any section of it, a demand for this Bill? Is there any evidence of such demand? One of the reasons given for the farmers not having their land revalued is that they prefer not to have a change, but to remain on the old valuation. So would the great bulk of the people who own houses in the towns prefer to remain on the old valuation. Is it not the fact that the Government dare not do it, so far as the farming community is concerned, at the present moment? In seven years, when the new cadastre is drawn up, and farming will perhaps have bucked up a little, then it will be the farmers' turn—after the towns have been sucked dry.

I have already spoken here of the disastrous effect which certain sides of Government policy have had on the towns. It has been disastrous for the farmer, and now it shows itself even more clearly in some of our country towns. They are practically deserted and they are now feeling the bad effects of Government policy which the farmers have felt before and still continue to feel, and in order to shove them completely over the brink, business people in these towns, who find it extremely difficult to carry on at present, are to have their business premises revalued. The Government took a number of years to awaken to what the farmers were suffering. Nothing that anybody said could induce the Government to open their eyes in that matter. How long are they going to take to wake up to what the country towns are suffering? This Bill is not an indication that they are aware of that problem— that very grave problem. I think there are many things which have tended to create a great deal of poverty and to interfere with the business of country towns and amongst them must be accounted very many sides of Government policy. This is only another addition to what the towns are called on to bear by the Government.

Deputy Cosgrave referred to the proposed revaluation of farm buildings. I do not know exactly on what scale these buildings, as distinct from the land, are going to be revalued—not the letting value, one year with another. What is the letting value of a farmhouse independent of the land? How is it arrived at? What standard is going to be applied? The Minister gave a vague indication that, so far as new buildings were concerned, he had some measure in mind which he would introduce later on. Here again we have another illustration of Government policy. Having done damage with one hand, they try to remedy it with the other. They are doing here what they do practically in every sphere. They determine, first, to make a number of people rich at the expense of the community by the imposition of a large number of tariffs. Having done that, they say: "We shall have to prevent these people getting rich at the expense of the community" and they appoint a Prices Commission to stop them becoming rich. Here they determine on a revaluation of farm buildings and we gather from the Minister, in a vague kind of way and at the end of his statement, that they may introduce legislation which will prevent the Bill having effect so far as these buildings are concerned. We can wait until we see that legislation to find out whether it will remedy the undoubted evils that must follow in regard to the improvement of farming.

As everybody knows, it ought to be the effort of the Government to promote, by means of proper buildings in the farmsteads, more modern methods of agriculture, and I should say that it would be much better that they should spend money in modernising farming in that way than in modernising the ports which they so spectacularly took over last year. It is the same with the case of housing in the towns; having given subsidies with one hand, they are going to take them away with the other hand. That is the policy of the Government right through. They think that, by interference, they can achieve something—interference is their only remedy, their panacea. The only thing this Bill will achieve will be interference.

This Bill does not contemplate setting up a big, new department merely for seven years. This revaluation is not going to stop in seven years. The increase in the Government Department is going to be permanent because the work will be permanent. That is another great achievement for the Minister. One thing in which the Minister has been highly successful has been in increasing the number of people in the Civil Service. Here is another Bill under which that will be one of the principal achievements. When the present scheme of revaluation is completed in seven years, the work will start afresh. Who is going to pay the bill? Mainly the local authorities. We do not know what the cost will be. Surely the Minister, in the course of his Second Reading speech, should have given us an indication of what the cost would be. All he did indicate— it is in the Bill—is that the local authorities would be responsible for a considerable amount of the cost. Why should the local authorities be asked to pay for what the Minister would call a "great national work" any more than they are asked to pay the salaries of the officials of the Local Government Department? What is the great difference? They are not asked to contribute to the cost of the Local Government Department, which attempts to secure the efficiency of local administration. Why, then, this provision?

This Bill will provide the Minister with an excuse for shifting burdens from the central authority, where they could be vigorously criticised, to the local authorities. That is one of the principal objects which it will achieve. Little can be said in favour of the Bill. The Minister repeated, in great part, what was set out in the White Paper. When he departed from the White Paper he was not serious. He put forward a number of big claims which he did not take seriously himself and which the House could not be expected to take seriously. The main objection to this Bill is its insidious character. It is an effort to make increased taxation easier at a time when reduction of taxation should be our aim.

Mr. Cogan

The first peculiarity about this Bill is that it is accompanied by an explanatory memorandum. When parents decide to administer an obnoxious medicine to their children they usually enclose the dark mixture in sugar coating. I expect that the same object was sought by the Minister in enclosing this obnoxious measure in a White Paper. People in all parts of the country, and particularly supporters of the present Government Party, are asking why the Minister decided to introduce a measure so unpleasant and unpopular. The only conclusion to which ordinary people can come is that the Minister's leg has been pulled by his permanent officials, and pulled so effectively, that he had not a leg to stand upon when he got up to speak in support of this measure. The main argument on which the Minister relied when introducing the Bill was that it would lead to a more equitable distribution of local rates. Anybody who gives a moment's consideration to the matter must know that this Bill cannot provide an equitable distribution of local rates inasmuch as it cannot affect the large section of the community who are not, to any extent, liable to local rates—people who are in receipt of fixed salaries or incomes from foreign investments or other incomes and who do not own rateable property to any extent. These people are, to a great extent, exempt from liability for rates.

To illustrate the inequality of the present system, which inequality this Bill does not remove, take the case of a Minister who has retired from office and who decides to live in a quiet, country place. He takes a small three-roomed cottage and he lives there on an income of £500 per year for life. What is his contribution to the upkeep of local institutions? He is liable to contribute to the upkeep of local services only in proportion to the valuation of the small house in which he lives and his contribution may not exceed £1 per year. Perhaps, on the other side of the road, there is an old-age pensioner, who has retired after 60 years' work in the most important industry in the country and who receives not £500 per year but £26 per year, on which he may have also to support his wife if she is not entitled to the pension. That old-age pensioner, with an income of £26 per year, is expected to make the same contribution in rates to the upkeep of local services as the gentleman with an income of £500 per year. That is an inequality or injustice in the present system which this Bill does not remove and does not attempt to remove. In addition to these two persons in the same district, you may have the holder of a small or middle-sized farm with a valuation of £50 or £60. That man is liable for a contribution to the upkeep of the local services amounting, probably, to about £20 per year, notwithstanding that he has no income and no pension and notwithstanding that, perhaps, his stock has been forcibly removed from his land by Government agents and that the industry on which he relies has been crippled by the activities of the Government. In this measure, which will cost the country a considerable amount, no attempt is made to remove the inequality and injustice under which that farmer labours. It has been suggested by the Minister, as a small concession to the agricultural community, that the effects of this revaluation will fall more on the towns than on the rural districts, that there will be a considerable increase in the valuation of the towns, which will have the effect of reducing, to some extent, the rates on agricultural land.

I think it would be a very poor hope for the farmers if they had to wait, in the present condition of the agricultural industry, for seven years for the small relief which may come under that heading. The point is if they could afford to wait for relief for seven years. I think it would be absolutely impossible and I think the Minister would find that long before the seven years had elapsed the pressure of public opinion would have forced him to introduce legislation completely abolishing rates on agricultural land and buildings.

It is not by any means certain that revaluation will reduce the liabilities of farmers in respect of rates. We know that on most farms during the last 50 years there have been considerable improvements made in regard to dwelling-houses and out-offices. As a result of that, revaluation will mean, on the majority of farms in the country, a considerable increase in the valuation of houses and out-offices, and that will entail an additional burden on the farmer who has made any improvement in his holding during the last half-century. That is, perhaps, the most vicious and obnoxious principle contained in the measure. It tends to penalise the farmer, or any citizen who has attempted to improve his dwelling or the buildings in which he is carrying on his work.

Let us take, as an example, two farmers who are not too badly off, two farmers who managed to make money during the war and contrived to hold it. Suppose that one of the farmers has invested his money in foreign securities, or elsewhere, or placed it on deposit in the bank and refused to make any improvement in his dwelling, out-offices or farm. That man will probably benefit by this revaluation. At any rate, he will not have his valuation increased. Take the second farmer, who has invested all his savings in the improvement of his dwelling-house and out-offices, thereby contributing to the comfort of his family and his employees. Under this revaluation such a man would be penalised; he would be made subject to an increased valuation, an increased liability for rates. That is a principle which no Deputy could stand over, the principle of penalising a progressive man, a man endeavouring to improve his holding, his dwelling-house, and the conditions of his workers.

Everybody realises that at the present time, apart from the distress prevailing in rural Ireland, one of the factors which tend to drive the youth from the land is the unsatisfactory condition under which people in rural areas have to live and work. Anything which tends to improve those conditions should be regarded as in the best national interests and, therefore, one would think that it would be the policy of the Government to encourage people engaged in agriculture to improve their homes, brighten them up and improve their out-offices and holding, thereby giving their families and their workers an incentive to continue to work and to remain on the land. Instead of that, we have the vicious principle, which I submit is enshrined in this measure, of encouraging the man who does nothing to improve his home and discouraging the man who tries to improve his holding.

The same applies to the towns and villages. We know that many small towns and villages present a rather drab and gloomy appearance. What will revaluation mean to the people living in those places? It will mean that the business man who has improved his premises, enlarged them and thereby brightened up the appearance of the town and probably improved the trade in that town, will be penalised as against the other business man who has made no attempt to improve the appearance of his premises or the general appearance of the town. One of our greatest national assets is what is described in this Bill as immovable property, permanent property, such as houses and buildings. A valuable characteristic that ought to be encouraged among our people is private initiative, meaning that our people should be encouraged to do everything possible to improve their houses, their shops and their factories.

This Bill will apply also to factories. We have in this country two types of manufacturers, one of whom is out to get rich as quickly as possible, to take the fullest possible advantage of every tariff imposed on imports and every protection afforded to home production and who has no real confidence in the country and is not prepared to build a permanent structure in which to carry on his industry. Under this Bill the so-called manufacturer who is satisfied to lease some sort of an unsatisfactory, unwholesome and insanitary building in some back street or lane will not be subject to any increase of his valuation. The manufacturer who has sufficient faith in the Irish nation and sufficient faith in its future to invest his money in the building of an up-to-date factory is going to be penalised to a certain extent by revaluation. That is an unsatisfactory feature of this measure. The whole object of the Government should be to encourage the man who has faith in his country and the courage and confidence to improve his property.

The main objection to this measure is that it does not provide any basis for a fairer system in the distribution of taxation. It is no indication either to the Government or to anybody else of a person's income, the fact that his property is in an up-to-date condition. Property bears very little relation to income. A shopkeeper whose premises may be very well built, structurally sound and up-to-date, may not have as big a turnover or income as a business man, a shopkeeper or a manufacturer whose premises may be in a rather dilapidated condition. Having regard to the fact that this Bill does not give us an equitable system of taxation, there is no reason why the entire community should be upset or why the confidence of the people should be severely shaken by the introduction of such proposals as we have now before us.

There is no reason why a considerable amount of public money should be spent on revaluation. There is no reason why a considerable number of officials should be occupied irritating and annoying the people of this country who are endeavouring to carry on their work. Therefore, there is no justification whatever as far as I can see for this measure. It is simply a measure foisted, as I have said, upon the Government by their officials and, of course, it will have the effect, the inevitable effect, of increasing taxation —not only income-tax but also local rates, because it will give local authorities an incentive to increase rates. If the valuation of property is increased, it will mean that the rates will be reduced by a certain amount in the £ for some time. That, of course, will be an encouragement for local authorities to bring the rate in the £ back to the figure at which it stands at present. The Bill simply means, therefore, that the burden of rates will be inevitably increased. For that reason, but most of all for the reason that it will upset the general community in carrying on their work, in carrying on industry and in carrying on their business, for the reason that it will promote uneasiness and uncertainty amongst business people, industrialists and every progressive section of the community, I think the Minister would be well advised to withdraw the Bill.

Mr. D. Morrissey

I do not think there is any doubt in the mind of any member of the House, or for that matter in the mind of any person in the country who has noticed that there is a Valuation Bill before the Dáil, that the real purpose of the Bill is to increase valuation. The Government, very kindly as has been said, circulated with the Bill a White Paper and I think that with a slight amendment of the first clause of the White Paper, we could get at the real purpose of the Bill. We are told that "it is proposed to carry through a revaluation of every piece of immovable property." Now, if you were to delete the four words: "carry through a revaluation" and substitute this phrase: "Under the Valuation Bill, 1938, it is proposed to increase the valuation of every piece of immovable property", you would get much closer to the real reason behind the Bill. If there is any doubt in anybody's mind as to that being the purpose, I suggest he should ask himself this question: why has the Government brought in a measure like this that must have taken a considerable time to prepare, that must have taken up a considerable part of the attention of the draftsman, and brought it in at a time when other more pressing problems are waiting to be dealt with by this House—brought in a measure, mind you, that, so far as we know, not one person, association or authority in the country, has called for? The last Deputy who spoke, asking why the Minister introduced this measure, said he was afraid the Minister's leg had been pulled by the permanent officials. I want to suggest that the Minister introduced this measure because it is absolutely essential to the extravagant policy of the present Government that they should try to squeeze more money out of the people of this country. That, and that only, is the reason.

The Minister, incidentally, in his speech said that there are only two places in the country where there had been any change in valuation since 1865. He mentioned the City of Dublin and the City of Waterford but, unless I am making a grave mistake, and I do not think I am, there was a more recent revaluation of another town, the town of Ennis. The valuations there were increased by an average of about 25 per cent. There you have, in that very example of Ennis, blown sky high the theory that by increasing valuations you are going to reduce the rate in the £ because not only did valuations go up by 25 per cent., but Ennis has—I am speaking now from recollection — perhaps the highest rate of any provincial town in the country and if we are to believe what we read in the local papers and the daily papers it is likely to keep that record for some time.

There are many measures that the people of this country have demanded. There are many measures that are urgent and that the people have asked the Government to enact. There have been many questions put to Ministers in this House, asking when certain measures are to be brought in and the Minister's usual excuse is that as soon as the pressure on the draftsman is relieved somewhat, these measures will be introduced. That is the bottle-neck through which everything must go, the draftsman, and measures which are of real importance to the country, and of real urgency, are delayed, we are told, mainly because of that. This measure, however, which nobody wants, for which nobody has asked, is rushed into the House and I suggest is rushed for one purpose, and one purpose only— that the Government of the country to-day are faced with the position, that both by direct and indirect taxation, both by way of direct taxation and by way of local rates, they have got to squeeze more out of the people, and to squeeze it out of the people at a time when their incomes are considerably lower than they were some years ago.

We are having this measure brought in to increase the valuation of farmers' buildings after one of the most disastrous and inclement years that farmers have had perhaps in living memory, as every Deputy in the House knows. Many Deputies who are themselves farmers know it even better than I do. At a time when the farmers' crops are in jeopardy, and there is practically no feeding for live stock in the country, we are going to have an increase in the valuation. Is there any farmer on the Fianna Fail benches who will suggest for one moment that there is the slightest possibility of the valuation of farm buildings in this country being reduced when this measure passes? I do not believe that even the Minister himself would have the hardihood to get up here and say that there is a possibility of the valuation of farm buildings being reduced as a result of the passing of this Bill.

This Bill, if it is passed into law, is going to affect every person in the country down to the poorest man in the country, down to the unemployed man, down to the man who is on unemployment assistance, down to the old age pensioner, down even to the person who is on outdoor relief, because every person in this country to-day has to pay rates. Many of the very poorest pay their rates weekly in the rent—those of them in towns and villages where the valuation is £6 or under. The landlord was made responsible in the first instance for the payment of rates on buildings with a valuation of £6 or under, but was given the right to increase the weekly or monthly rent by the amount of the rates.

Does anybody for one moment doubt the effect that this Bill is going to have on the consuming public of this country? Does anybody doubt for a moment that it is going to add still further to the ever rising cost of living in this country. Does not any person of any common sense know that if you increase the rates on factories, on warehouses, on shops and so on throughout the country, that increase will inevitably have to be passed on to the consumer, and that when it comes down to the last point you will have the ordinary farmer of the country, and the ordinary working man, the ordinary poor man, paying not only on the increased valuation of his own house or buildings but also paying the increase that is put on the shopkeeper or on the warehouseman or on the manufacturer.

Did the Government, when they were considering bringing this measure before the House, this measure to give them the power to increase valuation, have any regard to the present state of the provincial town? Is it not a well-known fact—at least well-known to anybody except to those who do not want to see—that, with a few exceptions owing to particular circumstances, most of the provincial towns in this country are on the down grade. For one reason or another they are decaying. There is less business, and there is less employment. Do we not know that, next to the farmers themselves, those who were most seriously hit as a result of what went on in this country for the last six or seven years were the ordinary country shopkeepers who were supplying the farmers of this country. There is not a Deputy from rural Ireland in this House, no matter on what side of the House he may sit, who does not know that that is quite true. Do we not know quite well that there are shopkeepers in provincial towns in Ireland who are paying £30, £40, £50, £60, or £70 a year in rates? Do we not know that there are towns in this country where at the moment the rates are anything from 11/- to 25/- in the £? Do we not know quite well that the majority of those people who are to-day engaged in business in provincial towns are making a great struggle to keep their doors open. Many of them have large sums of money due to them which they are unable to collect because in most cases those who owe them the money are unable to pay.

Difficult as it was for farmers to meet their liabilities to the shopkeepers prior to the last five or six years, it certainly was almost impossible for them to do so during the last five or six years. Deputies here know that as well as I do. I do not believe there is a single Deputy in this House, not even the Minister for Finance, who has any doubt in his mind as to what the effect of this Bill is going to be. I myself believe—I have no doubt about it— that it will result in a net increase of from 25 to 50 per cent. in the valuations of all immovable property in this country.

There is also another point to which I should like to refer. Although we were told that it will take seven years to complete this revaluation, I believe that almost immediately it is going to have a bad effect upon employment in this country. It is going to have a bad effect because, when the provisions of this Bill and—this is much more to the point—the intentions behind it become generally known in the country, there is hardly a farmer or anybody else who will be prepared to spend one penny in carrying out any improvements whatever, even those which may be absolutely necessary, not knowing from one day to the other when the valuation officer is going to arrive and increase the valuation if he sees a new chimney or a few new windows put in to make the house weather-tight. They will be almost afraid to improve their houses, and in particular their farm buildings, by an application of lime wash. We know very well what has happened, even under the existing powers, when people in recent years have attempted to improve their premises. Innumerable cases could be quoted, and there is not a Deputy in the House who does not know of them. A man puts a porch outside his door; the rate collector reports it; the valuation officer comes down, and there is at least 25 per cent. added to the valuation of the house. I am afraid that this measure is going to undo a lot of the Government's work in trying to induce people to improve their houses by offering them grants.

I do not want to delay the House unnecessarily. I do not think there is any necessity at the moment to go into the matter in any detail. I think it is quite clear that it is the Government's intention under this measure, when it becomes law, to increase valuations. They may say, as often as they like, that it is introduced to remove whatever anomalies may exist, but nobody believes that. Even the most enthusiastic supporters of the Government do not believe it. At this particular period of tension, stress and distress, nobody believes they are so concerned about anomalies that have lasted for half a century that they should be removed urgently at this particular time. I am afraid that particular excuse is a bit thin, even for Fianna Fáil supporters down the country, and if the Government thinks that they are fooling anybody they are making a grave mistake. People who have given any attention to the matter know what this Bill means.

The Minister who now occupies the Front Bench, the Minister for Education, is the only member of the Government who gave any little squeak at all about this proposal prior to the last general election. A whip must have been sent out then, because no Minister, and certainly no member of the Party, ever said a word about it afterwards. I daresay it was realised that it would be a dangerous thing to talk about on the eve of a general election. The purpose of this Bill is clear, and I have no doubt about the answer the Government will get so far as the public can make its voice felt through representatives of public bodies, or through other associations that may be influenced. I think it will be made clear, in no unmistakable way, that nobody, with the exception of the Government, wants this measure.

Mr. Esmonde

I oppose this measure for several reasons. The first reason is that there is no necessity for the Bill. There are paragraphs in the explanatory statement that was sent out, dealing with various matters in the Bill, but in not a single paragraph is there a suggestion that any class of persons, any body of individuals, or of public opinion, demanded a general revaluation. In the careful statement that the Minister made to the House, when moving the Second Reading, he did not amplify the preliminary statement in any way, and did not inform us if there was any reason why the Bill should be brought before the House or that it was based upon a general desire on the part of any section of the community. My private opinion is that the reason for this Bill is that certain administrative difficulties connected with revaluation as it exists have arisen in the Valuation Department. In opposing the Bill I do not want to disguise the fact that I realise there is a great number of anomalies, so far as the present valuation system is concerned. I also realise that these anomalies, for one reason or another, create the greatest inequalities between persons in occupation of rateable property.

Under the present system, and under Section 11 of the Act of 1854, and decisions thereunder, if a shopkeeper put a plate-glass window in his premises, if a trader raised the height of his house one storey, or if certain improvements were carried out to a building, the Valuation Department, after the proper machinery had been set in motion, were entitled to revalue such premises. In order to ascertain the value, recourse was had to Section 11 of the Act of 1854, and the courts decided, in fixing such valuation, that it was not proper or legal that the valuations of similar holdings, houses or tenements in the same neighbourhood should be taken into consideration. It was obvious to all concerned that the letting value—because that is really what it is—of premises to-day, and the letting value 70 years ago would be different, and a system grew up of knocking off something for that, and making some sort of fictitious valuation. That is the obvious difficulty that exists as far as valuation is concerned. There was a simple method of getting rid of that anomaly which, I gather, is the principal one worrying the Department. All the Government had to do was to introduce a short Bill to nullify the decisions of the courts, saying that when a departmental valuer was sent to value premises regard should be had to adjoining premises of the same character in the same locality. I believe that is the only difficulty that exists with regard to valuation at the present time, and that it could be got over in the manner I suggest, instead of putting the country to the enormous expense and bother of a complete revaluation.

I also oppose this Bill on account of its effect. It is a thinly disguised attempt to collect revenue. There is no question about that. Every individual is going to be reached by the effect of the revaluation of property. What is going to happen? We know the awful bogey and bugbear that exists in the mind of every person responsible for producing the local rates. Twenty shillings in the £ sounds like bankruptcy, and everyone keeps away from that figure as much as possible. Every local body keeps away from 20/- in the £ because it sounds like bankruptcy. If the country is going to be revalued, and if hereditaments are increased by at least 20 per cent., what will be the result? We have the example of the City of Waterford where the total valuation was increased by over 50 per cent. The net result will be that premises valued at say £20 to-day must be increased under the section in the Bill, if fair letting value is taken into consideration. If the valuation of premises is £20, when revalued £30 must be, at least, the true annual value. Where there was a rate previously of 15/- in the £, that may be reduced to 10/-, but eventually it will creep up again until it gets near 20/-.

Not only will there be increased valuation, but increased local taxation, based on that particular hereditament. In addition, everything is going to be disorganised. In his opening statement the Minister admitted that to complete this measure it is necessary to have a number of other Bills of a consequential nature. We will have a whole volume of Bills in order to complete this one, and to nullify the effect of almost any form of activity. Publicans' licenses will be all affected. Everything to-day is based upon valuation. Then will come the Electricity Supply Board charges, which are based upon valuation, and the increase in national taxation. The Minister stated that it is only right that owners of property should pay their proper share of national taxation. Everybody knows that the system of ownership, so far as large portions of property go, has changed under the purchase system, and under the social legislation that has been passed, and that gradually a state of affairs has arisen, by which each individual is in the position of being the owner of his property. The days of the urban landlords are rapidly going by the board, under the Landlord and Tenant Acts, and measures of that description, and so far from this revaluation hitting particular owners of groups of houses, it is really going to hit individual owners who, more and more, are becoming an increasing part of the ratepaying and taxpaying population in the State.

In addition to that, you will have an enormous increase in local taxation. I have already adverted to that. What is the effect of all that? It means that, either through local taxation or through national taxation, extra and additional large sums of money are going to be taken out of the taxpayer's or the ratepayer's pocket. That is dead money so far as employment is concerned. What is the first thing that a prospective employer of labour, a man who is anxious to start a busi- ness, or a man who intends to start an undertaking, looks to? He looks to a field where he can carry on his undertaking or his business under the best circumstances and free from one great entanglement that he always regards as very serious and very dangerous, namely, taxation. You are going to make this a highly taxed country. You are going to drive away private enterprise. You are going to reduce the opportunities of employers to increase employment because you are going to collect out of their pockets money that should necessarily be devoted to trade and business and to increasing employment.

So much for the effect of the Bill. I take it that the Party Whip will be active in this case and the Bill will go through in the ordinary course of events and probably pass this House. If it does, let it go through with a note of warning about certain matters in the Bill itself. I have referred to the definition in the old Act of 1854. The easiest job the Parliamentary draftsman had in this Bill was to take the definition out of the old Act and put it into the definition in this Bill that we have before us, word for word. As far as I can see, it is exactly the same, so far as the valuation is concerned. It is the same definition as in the old Act. It will meet with the same difficulties that exist in the old Act. I suggest to the Minister that he should alter that definition of how the premises should be valued. If this Bill must go through, and if the premises must be revalued, let us say that it should be the letting value, according to the definition, but make a substantial reduction on that of, say, 40 or 50 per cent. and you will get your equity just the same, and you will not increase the valuations to the same extent and will thereby keep down the necessary result of the valuation— increased taxation and increased payment of rates.

You always find in every Bill the most important matters stuck away in little holes and corners and, so far as we are concerned here, representing an agricultural country, the definition of agricultural land tucked away in the definition section is a most important matter for the consideration of this House. Agricultural land is set out as meaning "agricultural land less the buildings on it". The Government must recognise that there is a case for not interfering with agricultural land. I do not think the correct view of their recognition of that case is actually expressed in Clause 34 of the explanatory statement. So far as it refers to agricultural land, it reads as follows:—

"It is believed indeed that, as between farm and farm in the same county, Griffith's land valuations are still tolerably relative one to another and hence tolerably good as a basis for rating, and also that farmers in general would prefer to abide by Griffith's Valuation of their lands, to which they have been so long accustomed, than to have a revaluation of the land."

That is the explanation that is given in Clause 34, and an explanation had to be given because the general public are entitled to know why a distinction is being made between certain classes of property that were originally valued under Griffith's Valuation and property of another kind. That explanation is given. It is perhaps a plausible explanation but the real explanation is that the Government recognise the case that has been made time and time again that, not only should the valuation of agricultural land be reduced, but that agricultural land should be derated altogether. If that is the genesis behind this, that agricultural land is to stand in a different position, there is no sense and no rhyme or reason for excluding from the definition of agricultural land the most important parts to some farmers, namely, the buildings on the land. I submit to the Minister that it would be very wise indeed if he included in the definition of agricultural land the buildings which he has now excluded.

Take one or two matters. Take the case of a dairy-farmer who can only carry on his business under certain circumstances, namely, that he puts his outhouses and farm buildings into a certain condition, that he has his stores and so on fixed up in a certain way and with materials of a certain kind. That particular individual, who must carry on his business under Government regulation, will find himself in the position that his buildings are going to be put up. That is not an incentive to private enterprise in the country and it will put us back a very long way. Therefore, I suggest to the Minister that he should carefully reconsider his decision with regard to the definition of agricultural land. The increased trade and the increased business that would result from leaving the farm buildings as they are at present would, I think, amply repay the Government if they took that matter into consideration.

I have dealt with three reasons why I oppose this Bill and I have only one final word to say before I sit down. It is this. There is no doubt about it, look at it as you may, that there is not an individual in this country who has come to the age of reason and is able to think for himself that does not believe that the main object of this Bill is to create sources from which taxation, national and local, can be derived in future, and no amount of explanation will disabuse anybody's mind of that. Also, everyone here realises that we are on the brink of an economic crisis and that we are living in a fool's paradise. What does a good householder do under circumstances like that? He leaves his big house and goes around the corner into a smaller street and sets up in a small establishment. He cuts down his expenses and tries to live according to his means and to stave off the bankruptcy that faces him. But, in this Valuation Bill here we are moving from the middle-class house and we are walking out on the main boulevards and we are going to set up in a palace when we should have gone around to the villa.

Mr. Hughes

We are opposed to this Bill because we believe that the time is most inopportune for a Bill of this nature, that the terms of the Bill are inequitable and unjust for the general community and that it will have the effect, by the usual subterfuge of the Minister's Party, of increasing the already crushing burdens of taxation on our people. I would like to ask the Minister who has asked for this Bill? Was there any demand by any section of the community for a Bill such as this? As far as we are aware, no public authority or no public opinion in the country has asked for such a Bill.

The reason given by the Minister is that the anomalies and unfairness that exist in valuations has caused an inequitable distribution of rates and taxation. But the real reason for this Bill is given away in paragraph 17 of the explanatory memorandum which states:—"The need for a new cadastre appears also from other broad considerations. Obviously it is impracticable to go on down the 20th century valuing houses and buildings upon a basis of 19th century money values." That, to my mind, shows clearly that the purpose of the Bill is not to remove anomalies, but to extort more money from the unfortunate taxpayers for the purpose of maintaining the most extravagant form of government possible. That is the real purpose of the Bill. That is what the people generally believe and that is why they are very disturbed and very anxious about the terms of the Bill and the effect it is going to have.

I submit that there are other means to the hand of the Minister for removing these anomalies. As suggested by the leader of our Party, it could have been done on a basis similar to that in Northern Ireland. But, even if a revaluation was necessary, is this the proper time for it, when national income has been reduced by over £20,000,000, when the reactions and repercussions of the economic war are striking the country in full force? Even the most ardent Fianna Fáil supporter must admit that there is something desperately wrong with our main industry of agriculture, some cancer undermining the very foundations of this most important industry. The people engaged in the industry are crying out against the overhead charges, the cost of production here, and the difficulty they are experiencing in trying to make ends meet, and this is the time selected by the Government to increase the valuations of their buildings for the purpose of further increasing overhead charges.

We are told in the explanatory memorandum that the new cadastre will be based on the annual letting value, the change in which has resulted from the increased value of bricks and mortar in terms of money. Is the artificially increased value of materials to be taken into account and the imposts piled up by the present Government policy on such essential materials for building? Are the occupiers of houses and buildings to be mulcted on the increased cost as a result of these imposts? Take the materials that go to the building of a house, such as cement, slates and timber. As a result of the monopoly established in the production of cement in this country, and allowing the cement cartel to produce cement here and charge their own price for it, so that competition is killed and we do not enjoy competitive prices, the price of cement has been artificially raised by a very serious amount. The price of slates also has been increased by 50 or 60 per cent. Even the few slate quarries we had were permitted by the Government to be sabotaged.

Then all timber must be imported in the raw and planed here. There, again, you have a monopoly operating. Flooring boards, which are an important item in the construction of a house, cost about 12/- a square in the rough. When planed here by machinery they cost as much as 18/- a square, a difference of 50 per cent. piled on for the simple operation of planing. A square of timber can be planed in less than a quarter of an hour by an unskilled workman pushing it through a machine. For that operation alone, the increased cost of this important article in the construction of a house is 50 per cent., with the result, as has been pointed out by the Dublin City Manager, that the big difficulty operating against the Corporation in borrowing money for housing is the increased cost of production. We have the extraordinary position here that the cost of construction is 40 per cent. more than on the other side. I should like to ask the Minister if that huge increase is going to be taken into account in assessing this new valuation. It appears to be so, when special reference is made to the increased value in bricks and mortar in the explanatory memorandum.

Take the rural towns of this country. Most of these towns are depending solely upon the prosperity of agriculture in the immediate vicinity. Every Deputy must be aware that the rural towns are in a decaying position at present. The vast majority of them are actually in a stagnant position because of the deplorable position of agriculture. The only source of wealth of these towns was the money that flowed from agricultural prosperity. That has been killed by the rash policy of the Government, and this is the time selected by the Government for increasing the valuation of these towns. We are told that local authorities will benefit by this Bill, that borrowing powers will be increased as a result of their valuation being increased. Naturally, their borrowing powers will be increased. What effect will that have? It means that their spending powers will be increased and that they will get further opportunities of piling up the load on the unfortunate taxpayer. The temptation will be there to spend more. No matter how the Minister may defend a good many of those local authorities as being careful spenders, the fact remains that a big percentage of them are irresponsible and do not care two straws how the unfortunate taxpayers of this country are affected, and this is definitely going to give those people further opportunities of increased spending.

The Minister suggests that the agricultural community might profit by this Bill. I take it that he meant that the increase in urban areas and towns would be relatively more than on agricultural dwellings and other hereditaments. Now, I absolutely disagree with the Minister there, because my experience is that the annual revision has operated more in urban areas and towns than in the rural areas of the country. The annual revision has not operated to the same extent away back on the farms. A good deal of improvements, undoubtedly, have been made on agricultural holdings, new buildings being put up and so on, and it has not come under the eye of the annual reviser. I am convinced that experience is going to tell us that this Bill will actually have the effect of a relatively greater increase on agricultural holdings than on our towns. Is that as it should be?

The Minister referred over and over again to the anomalies and inequalities that exist, and claimed that that was an important factor with regard to the necessity for this Bill. The Government, however, have completely ignored the unjust and unfair anomalies that exist between particular sections of our people as far as poor rates are concerned. They have completely ignored the fact that one particular section of our people has to foot the bill for over 80 per cent. of poor law services in this country, and that is the agricultural community. The vast bulk of the money that is put up for poor law services is put up by the agricultural community, and there is no analogy between a man's income on the land and his valuation and the income of a man in commercial life in this country—a professional man or a businessman and his valuation. In any case, a man's contribution to those services and to local taxation ought to bear some relation to his earning capacity, but the Minister is not concerned about that and the Government have never concerned themselves about it. That, to my mind, is where the gross injustice of taxation occurs in this country, and I hold that the anomalies and inequalities that, we are told, this Bill is going to straighten out are relatively small in comparison with that injustice.

Apart altogether from the very sound case that can be made out for derating of agricultural land here, there is, and can be, a case for the absolute necessity of rate-free farm buildings and out-offices, cattle sheds, and so on, because owing to the peculiar climate under which we live in this country, and the very heavy rainfall, there is an absolute necessity for proper housing for our live stock. We have set up an Agricultural Commission here at the present time to examine what is really wrong with agriculture. That is an admission by the Government and, indeed, by everyone, that there is something seriously wrong with our agricultural economy here. To my mind, one of the things that is wrong —and it has been referred to by the Leader of the Opposition—is that we are the one country in the world that permits our live stock to lose condition during the winter period. That is a most expensive policy for this country, because it would cost relatively less to maintain and keep live stock in good condition when approaching the winter period than it would cost to let them lose that condition and then try to build it up in the summer time. Apart from that, by keeping our live stock in good form during the winter season we would always have them in a good condition at a period when the value of live stock might be higher. That applies, not alone to cattle, but to poultry and every other kind of stock on the farm. That is where we lose, as compared with other countries, when it comes to a question of competing with them for our live stock on the British market. We neglect our live stock during the winter period and let them lose condition.

Now, as I have said, one of the things that is essential for the preservation of condition in our live stock is good housing, because one of the first things that is produced in an animal by what it eats is heat, and you can supply heat to the body of an animal cheaper by providing good housing accommodation than merely through the medium of food. If we are to feed them out in the open air, it will cost relatively more than it would cost if we were to supply them with heat through the medium of a good warm house. This Bill is going to operate against the farmer's providing good outhouses and so on, because the moment he provides a decent house for his live stock, the Government propose to clap on a high valuation and make the farmer pay more for the sheds he puts up. That is not a progressive policy. It will retard and hamper agriculture in this country and, God alone knows, this is not the time for putting on the brake or retarding agriculture when it is now down in the very depths. Accordingly, I say that a perfectly sound case can be made for rate-free farm buildings for the housing of our live stock. It is a necessity, and I suggest to the Minister that, at least, he should consider that point carefully. If he is not prepared to withdraw the Bill, at least he should amend it and have a provision in the Bill for making agricultural hereditaments free of rates.

We are told that this new cadastre is to be based, as Griffith's Valuation was based, on the annual letting value. How is the annual letting value of farm dwellings and out-offices to be determined? I am not aware of any farm dwellings or out-offices being set or let annually, and I do not know how the valuation is going to be based on the annual letting value of something that is not being let, generally, in the country at all. I do not see where you can get a basis for the annual letting value. Again, take the case of business premises that are occupied by the owner and have never been let. In that case, also, where are you going to get a basis for the annual letting value, since the premises have never been let?

Mr. MacEntee

How is it done now?

Mr. Dockrell

A hypothetical tenant.

Mr. Hughes

I do not know how it is done now but the Minister may be able to tell me that.

Mr. MacEntee

It is done every day nevertheless.

Mr. Hughes

Well, it is not done on the annual letting value of the holding that has been let; when it is occupied by the owner it cannot be let; in that case you have not on the face of it the annual letting value there, because the place is not let. It is a hypothetical value pure and simple. I suppose you are going to apply the same measure to agricultural holdings. I do not want to occupy the time of the House unduly but to my mind this is an ill-conceived, harsh and unjust measure. It is going to have a very desperate effect on the people of the country and this at a most unfortunate period in the history of this country.

Mr. Dockrell

The Minister, in proposing this measure to the House, said that there were certain fallacies and certain anomalies in connection with the measure. He mentioned some of these. I am afraid he himself has used still greater fallacies when recommending this measure to the House. The whole method of valuing property is open to a great deal of objection, and apparently it is not going to be altered by this Bill. For instance, it has always been rather unfair, and if one takes the case of, say, two premises side by side that becomes clear. One is put up with some regard for appearances from the aesthetic point of view and the standing of the street in which it is built. The building is adequately lighted and heated, and the floors are sufficiently lofty. Now another place is put up alongside it. There is no money spent on the front of the second building; the ceilings are lower, and it is a lighter and worse type of building. It has always seemed strange to me that the person who goes in for the better class building on which he really gets no return has his building valued higher than the man next door to him, who can really earn more money on account of having more floor space, even though his employees have to work with less light and in a more crowded atmosphere. That is only one of the anomalies that still survive under this Bill.

Although the Minister mentioned certain cases they apparently will not be done away with when he has finished with this Bill. The Minister made great play as far as the local rates are concerned with this question of increasing the valuation. It is, he said, like Pat's blanket, it is as broad as it is long, and he said that if the valuation is doubled the rates will be halved and you are at the point where you started. That may be right theoretically, but we are all acquainted with what happened in this city in the past when something like what is proposed in this Bill took place. It did not work out that time in the way the Minister has stated. The real point is that when it came to Schedule A and the Government's share of the plunder, the Minister was discreetly silent. I do not know whether he hopes to rake in 33? per cent. or 50 per cent. additional to the Exchequer under Schedule A. I would like if the Minister can see his way to give us some idea as to what increase he is aiming at in the matter of the increased valuation.

The Minister mentioned that none of the local bodies had looked for increased valuations. I do not think anybody can charge the Dublin Corporation with neglecting any opportunity of availing themselves of getting increased money from rates. I am sure the Minister would not get much sympathy if he went down to the City Hall and started to expound that doctrine to the City Fathers. His action reminds me of the proverb where two cats had fallen out about some plunder which they wanted to divide. As they could not agree a monkey was called in and the monkey kept biting a bit off each of the two pieces until there was nothing left for the cats. It seems to me that the Minister's action is a little like that. It is certain that under Schedule A the people will have to pay. We will have to pay an increase of 33? or an increase of 50 per cent. under that head.

It seems to me that this is a most unfortunate time for the Minister to introduce this revaluation Bill because really houses and property are at a fictitious value. That is the explanation of why the Valuation Office has been making deductions from the valuations that they arrived at in order that they would bear some relation to the present-day valuations. The valuations that have taken place in the past and under this Bill are based on what a person would get for the property—the rent one would offer for the premises. I suppose we will call that person a hypothetical tenant. He makes a bid for a house but that bid is increased by the fact that at the present time there is an artificial shortage of houses.

We have had here for a number of years much higher wages than are paid at the other side. I am sure that labour can point out that they have a higher bill to pay for that. The cost of materials is increased by Government taxes. I imagine, if the Minister were to go into the matter, he would find that there are plenty of articles which go into the cost of a house that are 100 per cent. dearer than they otherwise would be, due to Government action. That has resulted in a fictitious cost for houses.

The Minister himself mentioned that houses here are 50 per cent. dearer than they are on the other side, but that is not the whole story. That applies to new houses. It is a well-known fact that the older type of house here, due to the shortage of houses, has held its value, whereas on the other side it has slumped, so that while the houses that are being built at the present time may be 40 or 50 per cent. dearer here than they are across the water, the older type of house here is a 100 per cent. dearer than it is at the other side. The Minister wants to cash-in on this artificial shortage, the increase in the cost of materials and to standardise this by raising the cost of Schedule A, more or less permanently.

When you look into that you see the cost that is facing people on this side. I observe that in Section 19 (I) (iii) that any alteration due to the Rent and Mortgage Interest Act is to be disregarded. Does that mean that the Act is going to be done away with? There is a reference to it in the explanatory memorandum. We would like to know is that going, and in what form does the Minister intend it to go. I do not think it is fair for him to bring in one Bill and tell us that there is another Bill hinging on it without letting us know what his intentions are. I have already mentioned that houses are on an artificial basis. The Minister has spoken of the money changes in relation to bricks and mortar. These changes may have taken place, and while the Minister may have had nothing to do with them I do not think that responsibility can be laid directly at the Minister's and the Government's door for portion of the increased charges.

Would the Minister tell us how far the Government are going to keep faith with people who are engaged in legitimate business over a number of years? Some years ago we heard that it was in the public interest, and in everybody's interest, that people should purchase their own houses. Having done so, the next thing that happened was that they were assessed under Schedule A on five-fourths of their valuation. Following that the allowance for repairs was done away with. All these changes had the effect of adding to the burden to be carried by the house purchaser. This uncertainty is causing people who used to make a business of investing in house property to more or less get out of it. There is not the same market now for people who used to invest their money in house property. That can be quite easily seen by anyone who tries to rent a house in the City of Dublin to-day. The number available for renting are few and far between. There is also uncertainty in connection with houses about to be built. Nobody seems to know what the position is going to be from day to day or from hour to hour. I mentioned earlier the anomalies that have arisen in the case of two houses put up side by side on a widely different plan of architecture. Another form that would be most disconcerting was mentioned by the Minister. The Minister said that firms who wanted to come over here and put up property——

Mr. MacEntee

I did not say "firms who wanted to come over here." I did not use that expression.

Mr. Dockrell

Firms that wanted to put up factories.

Mr. MacEntee

Yes, and there are people in this country who may want to put up factories.

Mr. Dockrell

I quite agree, but I hold that my remarks apply equally whether they come from this country or any other country. They will want to make a calculation as to what they will have to pay in rates, and apparently they will never be safe as regards their valuations. They will have to make an annual pilgrimage to the local Gárda Síochána barracks and there thumb over the valuation lists to see if, during the night, their property has been revalued. The corporation very courteously send a communication to rated occupiers if they alter the valuation on their property. That is a lesson in business and courtesy that might very well be made compulsory in this Bill. It is quite possible that a person who goes to examine the valuation lists may turn over a page or two and thereby escape seeing an alteration that has been made. The Minister may now, on his own volition, commence to review property. Apparently, having heard that one person had given possibly what was more than the market value for a property in one of the principal streets of Dublin, he may consider that to be the new basis of value, and at once proceed like a destroying angel down that street, ending up with new valuations for a whole street. That would be very disturbing. I do not think there is anything more unsettling for business people than to have to be watching from day to day and from year to year for values that are continually changing. I suggest that that is far more dangerous and would produce far greater hardships than any anomalies that exist under the present system. If the Minister is to have his way and whole districts are to rise, merely because some speculator has given a fancy price for one property in a corner of that area, people will have to be prepared to vacate the place because of inability to pay the rates. It must be remembered that people who have made their calculations on one basis of rates will not be able to pay twice as much. Some economies will have to be effected and some changes brought about. I suggest that the cure will be far worse than the disease.

The Minister, I suppose, is not going to tell us what increase he thinks he is going to get under Schedule A, but I want to suggest, as other Deputies have suggested, that there are far greater evils in this Bill than there would be if matters were allowed to stand as they are. Apparently, any labourer who builds a shelter for his goat is liable to have his valuation increased and to be served with a notice. Some of the previous speakers mentioned cattle and suggested that farm buildings should be exempt from the valuation with the houses. I do not know whether that is the position but, in other parts of the world, horses and cattle during the winter are served out with overcoats, and if the Minister goes in for this I think we, in this country, will have to resort to that system. Then, coming up to the autumn, we will see notices: "Buy your overcoat for your cow at such and such a place."

Mr. McGovern

You would need to take the tariffs off.

Mr. Dockrell

Do not talk to me about taking off the tariffs. Talk to the Minister about it. I do not think the position should be that part of a factory, because that is what it is, should be penalised by day-to-day increases under which people will never know what the real valuation of the property is for more than a few months. I appeal to the Minister to reconsider this Bill.

Mr. Bennett

I am in complete opposition to this Bill. The Minister, in his explanatory note—and indeed it runs all through the Bill—says that this is primarily intended to set up a new cadastre. "Cadastre" is a word I do not like. It has no appeal to the popular imagination, and I intend to use a different word which will be readily recognised. I propose to call it a new "catastrophe". The purpose of this "castastrophe", the Minister says, is to create equity in valuation, and apparently, from a cursory reading of the explanatory memorandum, equity in valuation, in the Minister's mind, means increased valuation, because he does not refer anywhere, as far as I can see, to any probable reduction in valuation. The consequences of this Bill would be great at any time, but its introduction at this period of our history, when we have evidences everywhere of poor economic conditions, makes it much more disastrous than it would ordinarily be.

Deputy Dockrell and other Deputies spoke of its effect on the cities, and they can possibly speak on that point with much greater knowledge than I. I do know, however, that the opposition to the Bill in the City of Limerick is very great. The probable effects of it are viewed with great apprehension there. I have received several protests—and I suppose the Minister has also received them—against its introduction, its effects on the residents and business people, and its other indirect effects. I do not know whether the Minister—I missed part of his speech—said that some of the direct effects of the Bill would be provided for in later Bills. I do not know how far these consequential Bills will go, and whether they will apply to such things as the possible effect of increased valuation on certain licensed people, but there is a fear in the minds of these people that increases in valuation will have very serious effects in other directions. There are a hundred and one effects that come to one's mind. There is the man who is on the border line so far as the net of the income-tax authorities is concerned. A very small addition to his valuation will bring him in.

It is, however, primarily of the towns and villages, the farmers and the rated occupiers, that I should like to speak. Almost every Deputy recognises that the condition of most of the towns and villages at the moment is deplorable. Many things have brought that about. The bad economic conditions in recent years have tended very materially to poverty in the towns and the change in conditions of transport brought about by buses, and so on, have also had their effect, so that, in travelling through the country, one sees many towns and villages which, up to a few years ago were fairly prosperous, now rapidly advancing to—I do not like to use the word "bankruptcy"—poverty. If increases in valuation are going to be general, and it looks like it, the condition of the residents and the small shopkeepers of these towns and villages is going to be very deplorable. One cannot envisage them bearing any further charges, and many of them will go out of business. The effects of the Bill will probably be more apparent, and more readily realised, by the farming community than by any other section, although the Minister said that its only effect on the farmers would be a good effect, that they would rather gain than lose by it. I do not know whether the Minister is sincere in saying that, but, if he is, I will make him an offer on behalf of the farmers of the country generally. We are willing to forego the benefits straight away if the Minister will exclude us from the Bill. Whatever possible advantages we are going to get from the Bill, we are prepared to forego and, in saying that, I think I can speak on behalf of the general body of farmers in my own county and in other counties.

The Minister knows as well as I do that he is talking ráiméis. I inferred from his speech that he is going to advance the valuation of towns and villages so that it will have an effect on the rates in the various counties. In other words, he is going to tax these unfortunate people out of existence. I do not see how he could possibly secure relief for the farmers otherwise. That was, I think, the meaning of the Minister's words. If he did not increase the valuation of the towns to a considerable extent, how could it have the slightest effect in reducing the general rate? We all know that, with the development of social services, the tendency is for the Local Government Department, which is the primary body connected with rating questions, to insist on local bodies spending more and more money. Everybody who is familiar with local government knows that. In fact, as Deputy Cosgrave said to-day, the Minister primarily responsible for local government, speaking to an appropriate body—the committee of a mental hospital—said that the rates in Limerick City were not high enough and he wished they were higher. The Minister for Finance is providing him with a way to make the rates higher, without the people readily recognising that they are higher. As the Minister knows, if you increase the valuation, you are not, therefore, going to get a lesser rate. It is all very well in theory to say that, if you double the valuation, the rate per £ will necessarily be halved. It will not. The tendency of local bodies, who are being urged by members of the Government to improve conditions, will be to increase the rates. They will say, when the valuation is doubled, that those concerned will be very well satisfied if, instead of reducing the rates by half, they knock off a couple of "bob."

Mr. MacEntee

What will they spend the extra money on?

Mr. Bennett

On the matters which the Minister for Local Government said he wanted money spent on.

Mr. MacEntee

Will they distribute the few shillings among themselves?

Mr. Bennett

What did the Minister for Local Government mean? He meant that there was not sufficient money to supply all the services he required and that he would have supplied if the money were available. The effect of all this on the ordinary farmer may be disastrous. Take a farmer whose holding has a valuation of £20 or £30. For every £1 you increase the valuation of his house, you impose a considerable rate-burden on him. If you increase his valuation by £10, it will mean that any possible relief he gets in any other way will be more than counteracted.

This Bill is remarkable not for what it includes but for what it omits. Was there any general request for this measure? I did not read of any resolutions asking for revaluation of houses. There was no general demand for it but there was a demand for revaluation of land by several local bodies, one of them in my own county. It was not acceded to and land is not included in this measure. The Minister knows that the consequence of any inquiry he would make in that direction would be a reduction in the valuation of land. So, the Minister left out land and he left out the railways for the same reason—because they are bordering on bankruptcy.

Mr. MacEntee

The Deputy does not know what he is talking about. The railways are revalued every five years.

Mr. Bennett

Not under this Bill.

Mr. MacEntee

Under existing legislation. Does the Deputy think we should bring in a Railways Bill because he would like to see them included?

Mr. Bennett

Houses in Waterford, which were revalued a few years ago, will be revalued again and the valuations will be increased because the Minister wants an easy way of camouflaging the extra burdens which he proposes to place on the people. This Bill will have a tremendous effect on agriculture. It will prevent farmers from providing buildings for their cattle, as Deputy Cosgrave said. It will have an even greater effect than that. We hear a lot of talk these days about beauty and culture. What effect is this Bill going to have on the beauty and culture of the country?

We exclude the land, but if a farmer chooses to enclose a bit of land around his house, to be used as a flower garden so as to make his home attractive, that patch of land immediately becomes liable to extra taxation and the farmer is penalised. If he encloses a patch of 100 yards around his house, he immediately runs it into this cadastre or, as I should say, catastrophe. That is all because he tries to embellish his homestead with a bit of a garden. This Bill is going to end any attempt to improve the living conditions of the farmers.

The Minister said that the general opinion as to the solvency of local bodies was unfavourable, and he went on to hint that this Bill was going to remedy that state of affairs—in other words, that the councils which at present cannot borrow enough money to satisfy the expenditure which is required are going to be enabled to borrow more money and, consequently, will be able to spend more, with the result that the rates will be increased. No matter how you look at it, this Bill means an increase in valuation and an increase in the general burdens of the people. That is what it means, as any honest Deputy who reads the Bill must confess. I shall oppose this measure and vote against it in every division.

Mr. Fitzgerald-Kenney

When he opened his remarks about this Bill, Deputy Cosgrave commented upon the gloomy faces of those sitting behind the Minister for Finance.

Mr. Smith

We did not see yours at the time.

Mr. Fitzgerald-Kenney

I can comment on a little more. I can comment, not merely on gloomy faces, but on silent tongues in a matter which concerns the farmers of this country to a very great extent, a matter which, I think, I will demonstrate before I sit down, interests especially the small farmers of this country to a very great extent. Even the smiling Deputy Smith from Cavan remains stricken with dumbness. The speech which the Minister delivered was not a speech which would give very much confidence to any of his followers. It was a speech more remarkable for what it kept back than for what it contained. It was a speech which set up propositions in one part of it for the pleasure of knocking them down in another part.

Seldom have I heard any speech delivered here so self-contradictory as the speech which the Minister delivered. It was most notably remarkable for its omissions. Surely, when the Minister comes into the House to introduce a far-reaching measure of this nature, the Minister who has got the Valuation Office at his disposal, the Minister who, by this Bill, puts the Commissioners of Income Tax and their knowledge at the disposal of the Commissioners of Valuation, he ought to come in common fairness to the House and to the ratepayers with a clear, open statement of what, in the opinion of the experts of those two Departments, this will mean in an increase in valuation to the people of the country. That is the first estimate one would expect to get, an estimate that must be easily ascertainable.

The Minister admits that the valuation officers are making their valuations from day to day. Surely, if those people are going to value on a new basis, they will have some idea how much more they will be valuing for and surely they are in a position to inform the Minister, not perhaps down to the last penny, the last £1,000 and possibly not down to the last £10,000, but certainly they ought to be able to inform the Minister within £500,000 or so, what the increase to the State is going to be. I do not know whether the Minister made that inquiry. I presume he has made it. I think anyone with normal intelligence in the Minister's position would make that inquiry from the Valuation Office. If the Minister has made that inquiry, which I think I am entitled to presume, he should certainly have put that information at the disposal of the House and the country.

The Minister told us that it was a foolish thing to say that this Bill was introduced for revenue purposes. For what other purpose has it been introduced? For what other purpose can it have been introduced in its present form except to extract more revenue from the people? The Minister said it was introduced to correct anomalies. That is not so. It creates anomalies in itself and no Bill need go this far to correct anomalies. I make a challenge to the Minister now. Will he undertake that in the new valuation of this State to be carried out under this Bill there will be no increase in the gross amount of the valuation? Will he say that the total amount of the property to be valued, though the value between piece and piece of property may be different to what it is now, will not be increased? I am not talking of properties which may come under supplemental valuations; I am talking of the properties that are going to be valued, and will the Minister undertake that, if his sole idea is to correct anomalies, that gross amount will not be increased and that merely within that gross amount the anomalies will be corrected?

I know what the Minister's answer will be; it will be "Certainly not". And why is the Minister's answer "Certainly not"? Not because he is very much interested in anomalies, but because he is very much interested in an increased valuation, and he is so interested because he is going to increase income-tax and because of what is going to affect my constituency much more importantly than income-tax, because he is going very greatly to cut down the agricultural grant, and he knows it. That is one of the main reasons why he has brought in the measure.

Mr. MacEntee

And when am I going to do all this?

Mr. Fitzgerald-Kenney

When you have carried out what you have embodied in the Bill through the Valuation Department.

Mr. MacEntee

The Opposition must be in a despondent mood if they think I am going to be here seven years from now.

Mr. Bennett

I dare say you have hopes.

Mr. Fitzgerald-Kenney

I quite agree with the Minister that he will not be here seven years from now. But the evil that men do lives after them, the good is oft interred with their bones. What good will be interred when the Minister is, not a physical corpse, but is what I would call a political corpse, as I must frankly admit to him I hope very shortly he will be. When the Minister is a political corpse I do not know what good will be interred with his bones, but I know there will be a very great deal of political evil living after him. It is perfectly obvious that the Bill is going very seriously to injure the agricultural community, especially the smaller farmers. That is a matter to which I will return in a moment.

The Minister says that to suggest that the Bill is for revenue purposes is a foolish thing. Has there been any demand from any place for this measure except the Income-Tax Office? Has there been a demand from anybody else except the Valuation Office? Of course, every office likes getting work and adding to its staff and to its importance; that is in human nature. Even commissioners of this nature like being important—they are human. Except from the Commissioners of Valuation, from the Revenue Commissioners or the income-tax authorities, has there been any demand to the Minister from anybody for this Bill? If there has, it has been very carefully kept back. Has there been any demand from any corporation or county council for this measure? If there has, they have been very careful to keep it back. Any such demands have not been published in any papers, and as far as I have seen any resolutions passed dealing with this measure by any county council they have been entirely hostile and adverse to the principles it contains.

One of the arguments, if I may call them so, which the Minister put forward, suggested that if you increase the total valuation of an area it would be very much easier to borrow money. Where does the Minister get that money from? Does the Minister mean to say that a sensible borrower does not know the real value of his security? Does the Minister mean to say that by changing the paper value of security, the real fundamental security is not there, or that by increasing the valuation of a town a bank will be more ready to lend on the security of the property in that town or city? He immediately contradicts himself because he says that the entrepreneur coming into that town will be taken by the fact that the rates are lower according to the valuation of the building. So the entrepreneur, coming into a town will say: “Here I have got a building which is valued, let us say, at £200, on which the rates are, let us say, 10/- or, if you like, £1 in the pound, and I am going to take that more willingly than I would take a building in a town valued at half the figure, where the rates are double, and I am willing to pay the additional income tax upon the valuation.” Surely the Minister has completely and entirely contradicted himself? But, he says, borrowers will be humbugged into thinking that the security or the real value has been increased by increasing the nominal value.

If that is the case, will the local bodies not come to exactly the same conclusion? Will the local bodies not have a tendency to become, to borrow the Minister's own expression, spendthrift? It is very easy for the Minister to talk about cutting down social services, etc., but it is the policy of the Government to hold that there are not many bodies in this country whose expenditure can be cut down without any loss of social services. If that were not the policy of the Government, I do not understand the promised introduction of a measure to bring in managers for every county council. Therefore, is this not a direct invitation to every county council that you have more money to spend, that there is not the same need of economy, or for looking into every halfpenny of expenditure, as there was up to this? Everybody knows that it has always happened that, as soon as you increased the paper valuation, the rate fell for a short time and then started climbing, climbing, climbing until it reached the old level. Exactly the same thing will happen in this instance. Besides that, the increase of rates will unquestionably check new building. At the present moment a person knows where he is. He has got a very fair idea of how things will be valued. The Minister has only got to read to-day's Irish Times to see how terrified a philanthropic body in the City of Dublin has become at the prospect of how much they will be charged in rates. They doubt whether it will be possible for them to carry on without increasing the charges to those who occupy their houses. I commend that report to the Minister. No doubt he has read it. The report also contained a statement, which is possibly a little irrelevant to this discussion, that a certain building society had ceased operations and entirely dropped its scheme owing to the high cost of building materials.

I come now to the matter in which I, personally, since I represent a constituency that is primarily a rural area, am most interested and that is the rates upon farm buildings. We are told by the Minister that farmers are going to gain as against the occupants of buildings in towns, especially in those counties where there are urban areas. In other words, his view, as put before the House, is that the incidence of rates between town and country is going to be changed to the advantage of the country and to the disadvantage of the towns. The Minister is looking at me. Is that not what he said? I took down his words. The Minister accepts that as what he said. Let me examine that for a moment. At the present moment, take the conditions in my county, the constituency I know. The ordinary farmhouse there on an ordinary £8, £10, or £12 holding—their holdings constitute the majority of the farms in that county—was valued at 10/- a year. Almost invariably it had a fixed value of 10/- a year. That was the ordinary country house of three rooms or a kitchen with two rooms. How are such houses going to be valued now? I turn to Section 19 (h) (ii). The rates are to be fixed upon the estimated rent and the estimated rent

"shall not be estimated at less than the rental value of such hereditament to the actual occupier thereof for the purposes for which he uses it."

That is to say that the value to the small farmer of the house in which he lives is to be its rental value.

The valuer will come down from the Valuation Department and he will say to the farmer: "There is your house valued at 10/- but it is as good, or probably a better, house than the labourer's cottage, which is valued at 2/6 per week, so we will put your estimated rent at 2/6 a week instead of 10/- per year." In certain cases the existing valuation of the house would, of course, be higher than 10/-; some of the new houses are valued at £2 or £3, but it is the old houses I am talking about, and they are roughly valued at about 10/- per year. These valuations are now going to be moved up to £6, £7, or possibly more. The Valuation Department will argue that if it is worth a labourer's while to pay 2/6 a week for a labourer's cottage, it should be worth the small farmer's while to pay much more than 2/6 per week for the house that he occupies. You will then have the position that instead of there being a holding of land, sometimes with a valuation of £5 and 10/- in respect of the house upon it, you will have a holding of land with a £5 valuation, a valuation of £6 on the house and, probably, £6 or £7 upon the buildings. That is how I interpret this section, and that seems to me to be the method on which the Valuation Department will work it out.

Let us look at it from another point of view. If a house heretofore rather negligible in value becomes of as great value for rating purposes as the land, it must be plain to everybody how the occupier of that house is going to be hit if he is paying rates at anything you like in the £, let us say x shillings in the £, on his agricultural land, of which the valuation was £5, and on his house, the valuation of which used to be 10/- but now has become, if you like, £5 or probably higher. At one time he was paying a rate from which the agricultural grant was deducted. Now he will pay a rate from which the agricultural grant will not be deducted, because the agricultural grant is not deducted from a rate on buildings. The result will be that the small farmers will find themselves in the position that they will be paying probably in some instances twice as much in actual fact in rates as they are paying at the present moment, and there will be a corresponding gain to the Exchequer. It is obvious that under this Bill the rates on farmers' houses are going to be increased. The Valuation Office, which must have been consulted about this Bill, have for practical purposes put that down in black and white.

Let us come back to Section 19. Read Section 19 (k). It is a long section, and I am not going to read it all to the House. It is dealing with houses in the Gaeltacht. The new houses were to be rated no higher than the old houses, and now the new houses are to be increased in proportion to the increase on the old houses. Unless it was the intention that the old houses in the Gaeltacht, and, therefore, the old houses owned by all small farmers in the country were going to be increased, that section would not be there. There would be no need for it. I dare say that 99 per cent. of those houses in the Gaeltacht were valued at just the sum I have named, 10/-. If the old houses still remaining were going to be valued no higher than 10/-, that section would have been meaningless. But that section has been put in there because it is known thoroughly well, known beyond doubt, that the valuations of those houses are going to be increased; that the persons are now going to pay rates far in excess of anything they have ever paid before, and are going to be doubly hit because that excessive rate which they are going to pay is a rate from which the agricultural grant will not be subtracted.

Now I come to another matter. Take the valuation of a new farmer's house. How is it going to be valued? I am talking now of the farmer whose holding has a valuation of £8 or £9 or £10. Suppose he had—as there is now a gradual tendency to do—taken a little bit of land in front of his house. He has made a gravel walk up to the house. He has put down a few flowers, or, in some instances, shrubs. He may probably have put a creeper up his house. I am glad to say that those improvements are taking place very frequently, and are an enormous improvement in the appearance of the country. What is going to happen? This land and the house are going to be taken as separate hereditaments. They are going to be taken as a garden and a house, and are going to be valued together. The Valuation Department are going to say: "What is the letting value of that house and that little garden taken together?" Of course, the garden never can be valued at anything else than its agricultural value. What happens? One person has made a nice house. It is ornamental. It has got its flowers; it has got its rambler roses; the house is a pretty thing to look at. The valuation of that house is going to be very much higher than the valuation of the house of a neighbour who has let his house get extremely dirty and untidy and unpleasant. Is not that so?

Mr. MacEntee

Not at all.

Mr. Fitzgerald-Kenney

Well what is the answer? It is the letting value of the particular house to the present occupier in certain circumstances, and where it has got a letting value outside it must be dearer. If that is not the case, what is the meaning of this section? What is the meaning of this definition if that is not the case? Does the Minister deny that they are taken as one unit? Does he deny that the house and the little garden with it are taken as one unit? Does the Minister deny that the letting value of that unit is to be the basis of valuation? Which of those propositions does he contradict? Does he say then that a house next door or just opposite to it which has no garden is to be valued entirely by itself?

Mr. MacEntee

The Deputy was talking about farmers' houses.

Mr. Fitzgerald-Kenney

I am talking about farmers' houses. I am talking of the houses of small farmers. I am talking of the houses of farmers whose valuation is £8, £9 or £10. I say that according to this, the little garden will be taken out of it. Any garden of any size will be taken out of it. There is no restriction of any kind. I see no restriction. Is not that the object of this? Is it not perfectly plain that the house which has been made nice with its little amenities is going to be rated higher because it has got a higher letting value than the neighbouring house which has not got such amenities? It is common sense. I presume that the Minister visualises that the Commissioners of Valuation will administer the law as he has put it here in the statute, and will use the definition from the Poor Law Act of 1928 embodied afterwards in the Valuation Act of 1932. I will now go away from the small farmer's house; I will go rather to the larger house, and I will ask the Minister: What on earth is a lawn? A lawn may be anything; any field is a lawn. Any field in front of or behind a house is a lawn. Suppose a person has a field in front of his house and grazes cattle on it or, if you like, tills it; is it to be a lawn or is it not? What is an ornamental path? Would the Minister give us some slight idea as to what is an ornamental path? I have not the slightest idea. Woods are to be taken as agricultural land, but an ornamental path is not agricultural land; therefore, one would be rather inclined to think that an ornamental path is a path without any timber, but that seems absurd.

I hope the Minister will try—not necessarily at this stage—when it comes to the Committee Stage to be in a position to explain this extraordinary section dealing with gardens, other than market gardens. Certainly, in rural areas it is a very unhappy thing to segregate them from agricultural land for the purpose of valuing them more highly. If a man is running a large garden it lessens the value of the house. It must be admitted that in places where there are large gardens, which would require three or four men, they are less valuable than places with smaller gardens. Advertisements in any of the newspapers mention if they are small gardens and do not require much labour. What the Minister wants to do is to shut out the gardens and to increase the rates, especially in the case of gardens attached to large country houses.

I could take an extreme case, that of Carton, which is, I suppose, the finest demesne in the country. How much of Carton is ornamental: how much of it could be said to be lawns; how much garden, and how much agricultural land? Surely that is a place that has no letting value, as far as the house is concerned, because it could never get a tenant. This is a Bill which nobody has looked for. If it passes in any form—I will not merely say in its present form—I believe it is going to bite very deeply into the pockets of small agricultural owners. Interpreted as it must be interpreted, the Bill, on the principle which has been laid down, especially in Section 19, must increase twenty-fold or more the valuation of small country houses, and, in consequence, must put an unbearable burden upon the backs of the owners of these houses. There is no getting away from that. There is no excuse. There is no use in telling us that the Valuation Office will not carry out the law, or that the Valuation Office never selects the valuation on the letting value; that what they do is to make a calculation on, say, the bricks and mortar. That is what I am afraid they did in a number of cases. It must be clear, and beyond all doubt, that this Bill for the revaluation of the country must increase many times the value of houses occupied by people who used to be called tenant farmers, but who are now small farmer owners. These people are going to be hit desperately hard by this Bill and by what it contains.

Mrs. Redmond

I am opposed to this Bill, for the reason that I believe it means increased taxation for an already over-taxed people. This country has had about enough taxation, and the people are right up against that. I am amazed that the Minister thinks fit to bring in at this time a Bill which is wholly uncalled for at any time, but particularly so at present. The small towns will have to bear the brunt when the Bill comes into force. It will be said that the farmers will get some benefit. I welcome any benefit the farmers can get from any measure, but I am not convinced that the towns in the country are now in a position to bear any increased taxation. Everybody knows that the small towns are on the decline. That has been happening for many years. Speaking of small towns in my constituency in Waterford, I say their business has diminished.

In some cases, the shopkeepers' takings are practically negligible. I understand that, to a great extent, that is due to the diminution of fairs for several years. Fairs and markets were in a large way responsible for the prosperity of the towns. Fairs and markets have been, practically, done away with owing to the recent dispute with England, and have never regained their former prosperity. Apart from that, for other reasons, the small towns seem to be terribly hit, and the people are unable to bear any increased taxation. I cannot understand how any Government could think that these towns could take on extra burdens.

I am not foolish enough to think that there is sufficient to be got out of the towns, so as to help the farmers. No such thing. The farmers will also have to bear the brunt of this Bill because the townspeople are not in a position to meet further taxation. Any little improvements farmers may have been able to make in their holdings in the past they are, certainly, not able to make now. Their stock has diminished, their capital is gone, and they are not in a position to pay increased rates or taxes. In my opinion this is the wrong time for the Government to tackle this question. This Bill is uncalled for as regards either farmers or townspeople. Farmers are viewing these proposals with great concern. I make a special appeal to the Minister on behalf of Waterford. As he is aware, Waterford City was revalued in 1926, and the people are greatly concerned. Surely they are not going to be brought within its provisions. I appeal to the Minister to take into consideration the fact that Waterford has recently been revalued and that the rating there was increased 50 per cent. in thousands of cases. I make a special appeal, therefore, on behalf of Waterford, to have it exempted from this Bill. If there are any benefits to come, if there is any come-back out of the Bill, as the Minister said there might be for certain people, I welcome the come-back for those people but, certainly, I do think that it is hardly fair or just to include them in this Bill. I make an appeal to the Minister, in all sincerity, to exempt them from this Bill when it means increased taxation in any shape or form.

Mr. Costello

Like my colleague, Deputy Bennett, I dislike the phrase "cadastre" and obviously, of course, the Minister loved the phrase. Deputy Cosgrave, in the course of his remarks, referred the Minister to a quotation in the Oxford Dictionary. Perhaps the Minister might like me to satisfy his curiosity, if he had any, as to that reference because it seems relevant to the description of the proposals contained in this Bill. In the Oxford Dictionary there is a quotation from some work dealing with the phrase "cadastral survey" and the quotation is,

"This new fangled phrase `cadastral survey' is as foolish as it is unquestionably mischievous".

I think I would like to apply those phrases to the cadastre that is contained in this Bill. It is as foolish as it is unquestionably mischievous. As I understand the word "cadastre" it comes from a Latin word meaning poll tax and then, in the Doomsday Book, we had the meaning of the phrase as,

"a survey of landed property"

and then it developed into

"a survey of landed property for the purposes of taxation."

So, whether in its original meaning or its derivative meaning, or its present meaning, the phrase used to describe this Bill, in a shorthand way, by the Minister enshrines within itself the idea of taxation. Whatever views you may take about this Bill as to its merits or demerits, there can be no doubt whatever that this Bill, in its scope and purpose, is a taxing statute.

There has been a considerable amount of discussion on this side of the House on the question of whether or not, as a result of this revaluation proposed in the Bill, when it is carried out, there will be an increase in the amount of rates that will be paid by the individual ratepayer or whether, as the Minister would have the House believe, this Bill will really only affect an equitable redistribution of the burden of taxation.

The Minister, I think, was very careful, at least in that portion of the speech I listened to, to avoid all reference to income-tax. I think it was a Deputy from this side of the House who put him the question about income-tax and he carefully disclaimed that any of his references in the course of his speech were made to income-tax. The purpose of this Bill was made clear by the introduction in the Finance Act of some two or three years ago of that extraordinary fantasy that emanated in the brain of the Revenue Commissioners that I think I once described as a mathematical nightmare of the Revenue Commissioners, the five-fourths valuation for the basis of income-tax. That foreshadowed the provisions of this Bill.

That mathematical nightmare of the Revenue Commissioners was put into the Finance Act for the purpose of raising additional income-tax, and it was put in at the time because the Minister made the case that property in this country was not valued in the way that it ought to be valued having regard to the present value of money. That is the real purpose of this Bill, apart altogether from the question of whether or not there will be any increase in the actual amount of rates that will be levied by local authorities. The real purpose of the Bill is to collect additional income-tax and we are told in the White Paper, which is admirably phrased and framed, as Deputy Professor O'Sullivan pointed out here early in the afternoon, that really the purpose of this Bill is to remedy injustice and do away with certain inequities and irrelativities that are in existence at the present moment in connection with the valuation of landed property in this country.

The first sixteen clauses of the White Paper really deal with the question of the object of the Bill from the point of view of remedying these crying injustices, inequities and irrelativities, to use the word Deputy O'Sullivan boggled at on a few occasions. Professor O'Sullivan said that he regarded the provisions of this Bill as insidious. I would prefer to use the description "sinister" to the provisions of this Bill because, while it may be made to appear that there is a good case to be made for this Bill on the point of remedying injustices and inequities, that particular injustice, if it exists, could be remedied by a much simpler procedure and by a very much less comprehensive code of provisions than are contained in this particular Bill before the House at the present moment.

The sole purpose, as the Minister would have us believe, and as apparently the first 16 clauses of the White Paper would have us believe, is to remedy those injustices. A very much simpler method and a very much less complex method could have been adopted to deal with the situation. One or two clauses in the Bill could have given the commissioner for valuation the power of initiative which he lacks at the present time under the present law, and he would then be in a position to remedy this by initiating the necessary machinery on his own mere motion. I do say this Bill is both insidious and sinister by reason of the fact that the taxing provisions of the Bill, the purposes of getting increased taxation and increased revenue in other directions from this Bill are masked by that sugar-coating about inequity and injustice. The real purpose of the Bill is contained in one sentence of paragraph 17 of the White Paper. There can be no doubt about that. Paragraph 17 says: "The need for a new cadastre appears also from other broad considerations." They are so broad they can be put into one phrase. Obviously it is impracticable, the White Paper goes on to say, "to go on down the 20th century valuing houses and buildings upon a basis of 19th century money values." There is the real purpose of the Bill in one sentence. Buildings in this country, farm buildings as well as buildings in provincial towns and in our cities, are valued on a pre-war basis and not valued on the basis of money values in the world at the present time. It is quite obvious that that cannot go on down the 20th century. It is quite obvious because, valuing on present money values, such as they are, must mean an increased valuation all round, for every type of house, for every type of building, that is going to be revalued under the provisions of this Bill; there is going to be an increased valuation of every hereditament and every building is going to be revalued under the provisions of this Bill. Consequently, there is going to be increased income-tax on that increased valuation, which must necessarily occur under the proposals of the Bill. There is going to be increased licence duty payable by the publicans throughout the length and breadth of the country, and there is going to be an increase in the rates under the provisions of the Bill for the purpose of discharging or helping to discharge the costs of the revaluation and the periodic revaluations that are provided in the Bill.

There is increased taxation without ever considering the question whether local authorities are likely to indulge in what the Minister called this afternoon "fits of squandermania." He need not go into the question whether or not local authorities are going to take it into their heads that, because the valuations of property have been increased and the rate in the £ apparently has come down, therefore, they will be inclined, as indeed there is no doubt they will, to raise an additional amount of money to what they are raising at the present time.

On the face of it, on those three items I have mentioned, there is going to be increased taxation as the result of this Bill. That increased taxation is not going to be borne by the rich alone or even by the comparatively rich. It is going to go right down through the social structure of this State and is going to have its repercussions on the rent that would be paid for a back room in a tenement in Winetavern Street, or Ship Street or Gloucester Street or anywhere else. If there is going to be increased rates as the result of increased valuation in consequence of the provisions of this Bill then that again is going to affect every class and every section of the community, rich and poor. There is no use in the Minister saying, even though the value of the property has increased, that that, as a theoretical proposition, is a sound proposition.

Experience has shown in every case where there has been revaluation that it has been followed by increased taxation and rates. Northern Ireland is squirming at present under the increased burden imposed on the people of all sections, rich and poor, the farmers and the people in the towns, as the result of the revaluation carried out at the behest of the British Government a few years ago. The City of Dublin rates were increased notwithstanding a rather recent revaluation of the city. Waterford was the same, Ennis was the same. Experience shows that wherever there has been a revaluation, although in theory there should be no increase in the actual amount of money paid by each ratepaying occupier of a hereditament, in fact the actual amount paid has in every instance been increased and the burden has been increased both in local taxation and in national taxation. That is what is going to happen under this Bill.

I should have imagined that if the case made is so obvious as is alleged in paragraph 17 of the White Paper, that we should not go down the twentieth century working on a basis of nineteenth-century money values, that at least when you come nearly to the end of the first half of the twentieth century, the system of valuation should at least be modernised. If you want to modernise the basis on which you will raise the taxation, at least when a Bill of this kind comes before the House we ought to have in it an up-to-date and comprehensive system, with new machinery and new methods to meet new conditions. But, instead, we have all the old judicial and administrative machinery going back to the middle of the nineteenth century. We have in this Bill cumbersome machinery that works against the interests of the taxpayer and the ratepayer. We will deal with many of these details in Committee, but I think that the House is entitled to demand that the machinery of taxation for local purposes, intermingled as it is with the machinery of national taxation, should have been brought up-to-date and new and comprehensive machinery and a codification of the law embodied in this Bill.

We are asked in the Bill to say that we are behind the times by a century in the amount of money to be paid by the ratepayers, and at least the ratepayers are entitled to see that there should be some modern standard by which the amount of his property should be assessed and by which his taxation should be ascertained, levied, and collected. But we are back in the middle of the nineteenth century and we are going to remain there in secula seculorum, because it will be, I am sure, another century before there is another revaluation Bill introduced in this country. We are to remain with the old machinery, with all its delays and its workings in the way of benefiting the collecting and assessing Departments at the expense of the ratepaying community. That in itself would be sufficient cause of complaint against the provisions of the Bill. But I say that, if it is so obvious as paragraph 17 of the White Paper says it is, that we cannot go down the twentieth century working on the money values of the nineteenth century, we ought to adopt some different standard of assessing annual valuation from what was adopted and devised at the time when Griffith made his valuation on this highly artificial basis of letting value, taking one year with another.

Mr. MacEntee

It is a wonder the Deputy does not want a change then.

Mr. Costello

The Minister apparently knows more than I know about what I want. If the Minister has any observations to make on anything I have to say, he will have any amount of time to make them afterwards. The Minister may know more of what is in my mind than I do myself, but I again repeat that the standard of value proposed in this Bill, taking it as it is from the old system founded on the 1852 Act, is a highly artificial value; and that if we are going to modernise in the way of money values, at least we ought to have some more modern and scientific system than this method, which is a rough-and-ready rule, and at best a highly artificial method of ascertaining the value in any case.

Deputy Cosgrave, in the course of his remarks, referred to the question of State grants by way of bounty in lieu of rates. I think he made a slight error in what he said, that it was not intended to have Government buildings valued. He has authorised me to correct that statement. It is only a matter of detail, and the point he was making still stands. I should like to know—and I make this point for the purpose of clarifying the point I have made that this method of basing valuation on a system of letting from year to year is a highly artificial one—how a valuer employed by the Valuation Office finds out how much a cathedral would let for from year to year taking one year with another, or how a church can be let taking one year with another, or even how a golf links, which is expressly mentioned in the Bill, can be dealt with from the point of view of valuation by reference to the standard of letting from year to year. There is no market for cathedrals on a letting basis. There are no tenants lining up at house agents looking for a cathedral. There is no queue lining up at house agents looking for golf links. I suggest that this is a highly artificial method of valuing property and that at least some scientific system might have been devised.

If the case is made, as it has been made for this Bill, that we should not adopt the old 19th century standard of money values and should adopt more modern ones, let us be more modern all round, modern in the standard by reference to which the valuation is to be fixed, modern in machinery, and in the judicial system dealing with the appeals from the Commissioners' award. We have in the Bill, as I say, this highly artificial standard employed. If it is so obvious as is stated in paragraph 17, it does not need the careful statement of the position made in the first 16 paragraphs of the White Paper with reference to the injustice and the inequities. I represent a purely urban constituency, and I do not intend to trench on the domain of my colleagues who represent agricultural constituencies, but I think it only right to point out, and the point has already been mentioned by Deputy O'Sullivan, that if it is so obvious, as stated in paragraph 17, that you cannot go down the 20th century basing your valuations on 19th century money values, in respect of the city dwellers and the city houses, it is equally obvious, in paragraph 34, that the farmers must be let have their old value on the old money, on the old agricultural values upon which Griffith's Valuation was based— because they are accustomed to it. City people are accustomed to it. The valuers in Dublin are accustomed to certain values and they have in their own minds a certain standard by which they work, which enables them to arrive at a rough and ready valuation in valuing property. They are accustomed to that and they know how to arrive at it, but now they are going to have a new system and new conditions if this Bill passes in its present form.

You are not to have that for the farmers because it is quite clear that under the present system of money value in Dublin, Limerick, or the provincial towns, by reason of this so-called increase in money values, it is inevitable that every piece of property will be increased in its valuation. That is all right for the towns and cities, but it was clearly apparent—obvious, to use the word of paragraph 17—that if farmers were allowed to have recourse to present conditions, present money values, in reference to their produce, their valuations would not be increased, but decreased. Hence, the camouflage of paragraph 34, which says that agricultural land situate outside four county boroughs will continue to be valued on the figures of Griffith's Valuation, because farmers are so long accustomed to it. It is not because they are so long accustomed to have their farms valued according to Griffith's Valuation, but because the value of agricultural produce and the value of money in agriculture and in agricultural land has gone down considerably from what it was when Griffith's Valuation was made, and the result would have been that, if this were allowed, the valuation of every farm in this country would be decreased. That is the reason why this concession, as, apparently, it is made to appear in this White Paper, is put forward to the farmers. We are going to allow the farmers to keep what they have; we are not going to interfere with them, and they ought to thank us for that! They are not going, however, to be allowed off in connection with their buildings, which are going to be assessed on the same value as buildings in cities and towns, and the position is made absolutely apparent by reference to the provisions of Section 19, clause (a) of the Bill as it stands at the moment. Section 19, clause (a), says:

"Every hereditament which consists wholly of agricultural land not situate in a county borough shall be valued at the old valuation thereof."

Shall be valued at the old valuation thereof! There is no appeal for the farmer from his present valuation. He is not entitled to appeal. By statutory provision of a mandatory character the existing valuation is to go into the valuation lists, and no farmer in this country, henceforth, as far as I can see from my reading of the Bill and my interpretation of its construction, can appeal at any time in the future against the valuation of his land. The valuation is fixed for all time, until another statute may be brought in. That is the so-called concession to the farmers. They are accustomed to their old valuation. Money values were against the taxing provisions or the taxing purpose of this Bill where it impinges upon agricultural land. Where it has reference to houses in the towns or cities, then you are not to go down to the 19th century for the 20th century money values.

Deputy Cosgrave asked, as a test as to whether this Bill should go through this House or not: Is this the time for such a Bill as this? Take the pre-1914 money values. Is it that our Circuit Court judges or our District Court judges are so young that they have forgotten the pre-1914 money values, as the White Paper would seem to suggest? Are the valuers in the Valuation Office so young that they have forgotten the money values of that period? At least, it can be said that these values were stable. They were something to which reference could be had, something that was ascertained, fixed, defined and made definitive in a period of tranquillity and peace. We are asked here to pass a Bill providing for the valuation of land and property in this country at a time of flux and change in every aspect of our political and economic life. The money values of the 20th century—what are they? Are the money values of today the same as those of last week, or are they the same as they will be next week, or in seven years' time when the revaluation of the whole country will be finished as is anticipated in accordance with the Minister's desires in the provisions of the Bill? Moneys and money values have no anchorage at the present moment in the richest and most stable countries in the world. What have they at the present time? What standard is that, by reference to which you fix your value as the value with which you will walk down in confidence and base your system of taxation for perhaps 50 years to come during the next half of the 20th century? What standard is that on which we are asked to base the provisions of this Bill in reference to ascertaining the value of land? Moneys are changing in value every day. Economic conditions are changing. We are facing the horror of war every morning that we read the newspaper, and I should not be surprised if we found that we were again plunged into a war even worse than the war of 1914 to 1918 which has resulted in the present instability throughout the world in financial and economic affairs.

That is the time when it is considered right that we should depart from the nineteenth-century money values, which, as I say, at least had stability, at least had some relation to a scientific basis on which the value of property could be assessed, and we are now asked to assess it on the shifting sands of present financial systems of the world and on the economic structures of even the most prosperous countries in the world. We are asked to do that at a time when, in our cities, and probably in the towns—certainly, in the city here, because I can speak of that from my own knowledge—the shortage of houses is such, and has been such since the War years, and will continue to be such for many years to come, that there is really no proper market for letting or taking houses on lease at the present time. In pre-War days, as the White Paper says, builders built houses as a speculation and let them to tenants and collected the rents, and the ordinary competitive forces in that particular market adjusted the value of the rents they were getting for the houses. On that basis, some approach could be made to a scientific calculation of the letting valuation of a house, taking it from year to year, one year with another. Now, it is within the knowledge of everybody that for the last 15 or 20 years, to put it at its lowest, it has hardly been possible for the ordinary person in this country, the ordinary middle-class person of comfortable means, or even the ordinarily wealthy person, to get a house on a two, three, four or five years' letting. There is no market for them at the present time. If you wanted to get a house during the last 20 years, you had to buy it and, in my opinion, if you want a house during the next ten years at least, you will have to buy it. Ordinary people, people below the level of the comfortable middle classes, if you like—people below the level of the artisan or tradesman class, have to buy their houses by State-aided help on the instalment system spread over 50 or 60 years. Then there are the poorer people who have to get subventions from the State to buy their houses.

Where is the market by reference to which we are to assess the letting value of the most ordinary house at the present time? It is clear to demonstration that this is not the time for this Bill. New houses have been built in the last ten or 15 years. These houses have been valued by the Valuation Office. Presumably the valuers did their work well. They are experts at that work even though they are short-handed. At all events they did their work and put a valuation on these houses in the last ten or 15 years. What is the necessity now for a revaluation of houses built, let us say, quite recently? Are these again to be revalued by the Valuation Office after having been valued any time within the last ten years? Some of these houses may have been valued in the last ten weeks and are they to come within the scope of this Bill? I say it is not just that these houses should be brought within its scope.

Anybody who has any knowledge and experience in connection with the property market knows that one of the elements that are taken into consideration in ascertaining and fixing, first, the reserve price by the auctioneer, and, secondly, the price to be offered by the intending purchaser, is the Poor Law Valuation of the property. People have put their savings into small houses in the last five or six years on the basis of the value or less than that value fixed by the Valuation Office. They had been forced to buy those houses because of their need of a house and their failure to get a house on lease. They have had to borrow the money, or at least to raise portion of the purchase money. They have fixed their family budget and their futures on the basis of the Poor Law Valuation of that house as recently fixed on new houses by the officials of the Valuation Office. Now these people are going to be faced with the operation of this Bill and an increased valuation is to be put on their houses. The same test was in operation last week in reference to the house which was valued last week as will be in operation under this Bill. The house that was valued last week will, under this Bill, necessarily, have its valuation increased. I want to know what is the justice and equity of that consideration?

One of the matters that has to be taken into account in assessing the Poor Law Valuation is the costs returns. The price of bricks and mortar, as the White Paper says, is to be given full scope and effect to. We all know that in the last few years building materials have gone up in price and value by an appalling amount. The price of bricks and mortar in this country is something like 40 per cent. higher than the price of similar materials across the water. Is a fluctuating element of that kind to be taken into account? The increase in the price of these materials is caused by the tariff policy in operation here, a policy, necessarily, based on something transient. Yet, that is one of the elements to be taken into account in fixing, on a permanent basis, the valuation of house property in this country.

The Bill in its details is cumbersome and out of date. We can deal with these matters when we come to consider the details of the Bill in Committee. Taking the Bill as a whole I can say this, that nobody has asked for it except those people who require additional revenue for State purposes. There have been no outeries to remedy injustices. There has been no public effort to use the existing machinery which is at the disposal of people who are suffering from those injustices. There has been no demand for this Bill from any quarter except the Department of Finance and the Revenue Commissioners. Its whole design is for an increased revenue with the incidental and almost inevitable consequences of increased local taxation. It is an unjust Bill and a Bill that is uncalled for. It is a Bill that will increase inevitably the burdens on the ratepayers and on the taxpayers. It will unsettle everybody and put them to additional legal costs. It is a Bill which the profession I represent will welcome because it spreads out in front of that profession a vast vista of litigation in the next ten years.

Mr. Belton

It is a lawyers' Bill.

Mr. Costello

It is a lawyers' Bill if you like. But at the start it is a Bill to make the ratepayers and the taxpayers liable to additional taxation and increased expenditure for officials in the administration of the Bill when it becomes an Act. It must increase the permanent provision for the Valuation Office for the work that is to go on as a result of its enactment. It is a Bill that is sugar-coated with equity but underneath in its core it is a very bitter unpalatable Bill indeed for the public as a whole.

Mr. McGovern

I am opposed to this Bill though I would support it if it were what it purports to be. I have always a use for equity and relativity, but this Bill does not stand for these things. If the Minister could convince me that it stands for either I would support the Bill. It is, however, the very opposite. He told us that it is not intended to increase the income-tax. Later on he told us that it is not intended to increase the rates but that its sole purpose is to bring about equity and relativity. On this point I want to make a few remarks. Is it really in order to bring about equity and relativity that the Minister clamours for the Bill in his explanatory memorandum? I hold it is not, because he did not touch the point of equity and relativity at all as regards local rates. The Bill may mean relativity as between individuals or relativity in a district or county, but as between class and class there is in it no relativity and there is no equity. The Minister did not even pretend that it deals in an equitable manner as between class and class. If we take the case of the farmer, the agriculturist, see how it affects him. Does the Minister claim that there is equity or relativity in the assessment of rates upon valuation as houses are valued? What does the valuation of the land mean? You will get some land valued at 1/- an acre and other land at £2 an acre. Why are these differences based upon the annual value of land?

Therefore, a tax levied on land is, in reality, income-tax. It is levied on the basis of the income out of land. The same thing does not apply to any other class of people in this State. It is not supposed that the valuation put on buildings represents the total income of the occupant of those buildings. Not at all. It is a certain standard of value fixed upon the buildings that the valuation represents. It does not at all pretend to represent the total income of the occupier. You may get a man with an income of £1,000 a year living in a house with a valuation of £20. You may get, on the other hand, a farmer whose valuation is £30 and whose income is not £30. In some cases he has not half of it.

That is why the Minister did not touch agricultural land and, because he has not done that and has not dealt with the whole question of equities and relativity as between every class of citizen, I say this Bill is only a mockery. It is hypocrisy of the Minister to say that in this Bill he is dealing with the equities and with relativity, and that through it he intends to bring about these things. That is why I object to the Bill. I do not know what its real purpose is, but if the Minister intended to deal with the equities and with relativity he would have brought in agricultural land. If he had done that we could believe that he was sincere. I think the Minister should adjourn consideration of the Bill until he is prepared to deal with the whole question of the equities and relativity. Unless he does that we cannot take it that he is sincere.

The Minister referred to the changes in the value of money. He proposes to fix the valuations upon the value of money in the twentieth century. The present value of the £ is 11/6. If the Minister's valuation was to be based on the £, in terms of gold, then it would mean an increase of 74 per cent. Is it his intention to increase valuations on all houses by 74 per cent., or is it his intention, if the £ drops in value to 5/- within the next two years, to have valuations revised? Does he propose to send out valuers all over the country every time that the value of the £ changes, and it is changing now almost every day? If that is his intention he would want to have valuations carried out twice a year instead of every seven or eight years. How can the Minister hope to fix valuations now when the value of the £, in terms of sterling, is only 11/6? Supposing that the day after the valuations under this measure were fixed the Bank of England decided to go back to the gold standard, to anchor the £ to gold——

Mr. Belton

The Minister would shout "Up the Republic".

Mr. McGovern

——would the Minister change the valuations immediately? I am afraid this method will mean changing them every day in the year. I think this is a most absurd standard to go by.

Mr. MacEntee

Would the Deputy say how many times has the anchoring and the loosening, of which he talks, taken place this year?

Mr. McGovern

Does the Minister propose to change the valuations every time there is a change in the value of the £?

Mr. MacEntee

The Deputy says that we are going to do this every year.

Mr. McGovern

How long is the valuation supposed to last? The revisions that he proposes to carry out cannot possibly deal with more than one-seventh or one-eighth of the country each year. Look at the burden that will put on the people—two-fifths of a penny for these small revisions, after the expenditure for the initial revaluation. All that we are to get out of this Bill is an increased burden all round of two-fifths of a penny each year for the revaluation. That is to be in perpetuity.

There is to be an increase in the value of all buildings. Deputy Hughes asked the Minister by what standard or rule did he propose to fix a value on buildings that are not let. Farm houses are not let. By what standard, therefore, is he going to fix a valuation on them? Is the answer to be found in Section 19, paragraph (1) (ii):—

such estimated rent shall not be estimated at less than the rental value of such hereditament to the actual occupier thereof for the purposes for which he uses it, no regard being had to the circumstances (if it exists) that if the actual occupier ceased to be in occupation the rental value of such hereditament to any subsequent occupier would or might be less than to the said occupier.

What does that mean? That if I am living in a house on a farm of land, and if the latter is worth £200 a year to me, then the house is supposed to be worth £200, and the valuer is given the right under the section to fix the valuation at £200, even though the house may be only a £5 or a £10 house. Therefore, I take it that there is no limit to the valuation that a valuer may put upon a farmer's dwelling house. He may decide that it is worth the whole value of his farm to him, because if the farmer left the house what good would the farm be to him? He could not carry on business at all. That is a most extraordinary provision.

I do not want to go into details on this Bill. I have stated why I am opposed to it. It purports to be a Bill to deal with the equities of the case, but it makes no attempt to do that. There are more faults in the Bill than good points. It is on the one good point that is supposed to be in it that I am opposed to it. There is no justification whatever for claiming that this is a Bill to bring about a more equitable or a more relative position, and that is why I am opposing it.

Captain Giles

Like my colleagues I am strongly opposed to this Bill. I believe it is nothing more than another of those sugar-coated pills which must do its dirty work under a cloak. As a matter of fact, of course, this is simply another of those cleverly conceived measures for increasing taxation and of letting loose on the country a fresh horde of well paid efficials, who will go up and down the country for the next seven years bleeding the taxpayers white. Does the Minister think that a Bill like this is going to tend to help our decaying villages and towns? If he does, he is making a great mistake. Like each and every one of us. I think he knows the position in the country. He knows that there is not alone a flight from the land, but from the towns and villages, and this is taking place for no other reason than that our country is overtaxed and people must fly from this desperate taxation. The present system of taxation is nothing more than a continuation of the old rack-rents for which the landlords were hounded out of the country. If that represents freedom, then God keep us from this type of freedom. We, of the old Republican Army, who fought to give this country the right to choose its own government and to work out its own salvation, did not do so in order to have the country taxed to the point to which it is taxed to-day. It is now in a far worse position than it was even during the worst times of the British régime.

I notice that in the Bill there is no talk of a revaluation of land, and we all know why that is so. It is because, if land were to be revalued, the value would have to go down and that would not suit the Minister. No, he must get his pound of flesh. This Bill was not called for by anybody, and I think it would be time enough for the Minister to introduce it when the people demanded it. The towns and villages did not demand it, nor did agriculture demand it. The Minister himself is the only person who wants it, in order to help his depleted till. The people demanded one thing, derating of agricultural land, and the Minister did not hearken to their appeal because it would mean dipping into his till. I am quite satisfied that not alone should there not be increased taxes on farm buildings, but there should be no taxes at all. Rather should there be free grants given to help our country people to build more and more sheds and out-offices to assist the successful carrying on of their industry. We are told that we must try to bring all the tourists we can into the country so that they may see the lovely scenery. We have some lovely scenery, but if we pass Bills like this, what will we have in the next few years? We will have nothing more than tumble-down shacks and stables and sheds with the slates and roofs taken off for the purpose of escaping this taxation. We do not want to see that type of thing, nor do we want the tourists to see it, but that is what we are certainly going to have if this Bill is passed. All over the country at present one can see many large buildings with the slates and the roofs taken off. They are an eyesore to everybody, and it is done for the purpose of escaping taxation. Our villages and towns at present are fast going into decay, and our fairs and markets are gone. Now, the Minister wants to increase the valuation of these decaying towns. I do not know if he is in his proper senses. If he is, it is my belief that he never goes outside Dublin. If he came down to the midlands, he would tear up this Bill and bring in another to give relief to those towns and villages.

We strongly oppose this Bill, and we do so proudly, because it is one of the things which it is our duty to do because we are not going to help to strike down our people. It is our duty to try to raise them up and give them that peace of mind which they have not had for the last six or seven years, and the right to work their own homes in their own way and in their own time and not to be harassed from morning to night by official after official, one coming to put on a new valuation and another to gather the taxes from that valuation. I had the experience, not six months ago, of having one of these gentlemen coming to my place. For the last six or eight years I have tried to build up a little home and to add new buildings each year. In some way these officials found out that I was beginning to get on my feet, and one day I found one of them in my place with a big car. He had something in his hand, and I thought he was one of these travelling Jews who sell shoddy stuff all over the country. If he was I can tell you he would get outside the gate, but he was one of the valuation officers and he had a ruler in his hand longer than himself. He was running around building after building, and he had not even the decency to tell me he was there or to bid me good day. That, of course, is what I would expect. That is what we have since we got this great Irish government—a horde of officials who care nought about the people who have to pay their salaries. They come around like thieves, do what they like and get away with it.

We will not help the Government to fleece our unfortunate people any further. We will stand firmly against this Bill, as we have stood against all injustice in the last six or seven years. I say to the Minister: "Realise that on you, and you alone, depends either degradation or the salvation of this country; up to the present you have done nothing but strike down our people. I say to you: At least try to undo a lot of the dirty work you have done; try to relieve our people of the taxes you have put on them and give them at least a little comfort for the few days they have to live; give the farming community derating of their lands; give them free grants to put up their stables and cattle sheds so that they can compete with the countries of the world for world markets. Do that and you will be doing something honourable. I am sorry to say that you have done nothing honourable since I saw you enter public life here."

Mr. Gorey

There is one aspect of this which the Minister glossed over in his explanatory statement. It has reference to agriculture. He seemed to indicate that the farmers were absolutely satisfied with the present position of valuation, but if ever there was one voice raised with regard to valuations in this country it was raised by the farming community, and raised because of the fact that valuations were made in '52 and '56 of the last century, based on a position which does not obtain to-day and has not obtained for the last 35 or 40 years. If ever there was a word uttered against the unfairness of the valuations, as they applied to land, it was uttered by the farming community, and even in this House. Griffith, when making his valuation, made it at a time when wheat was £3 a barrel.

Major General MacEoin

Hear, hear! That is the kernel of the whole thing.

Mr. Gorey

And when the overhead costings were, practically speaking, nil, because people worked for nothing, because wages in these days were practically nil, except in respect of grub in the days immediately following the Famine. Farming to-day has altogether changed and it is bolstered up by your subsidies to wheat and beet into an artificial position. The fact is, however, that there is better dairy land, better cattle land, at 5/-, 7/6 and 10/- valuation per large acre, land which is better than the tillage land of 100 years ago, which carries to-day 27/6 and 30/- valuation. It is because of these inequalities that you do not interfere, or propose to interfere, with the agricultural position, and it is because you were catering for certain pet counties which give you the best return to this House, such as Leitrim, Kerry and Limerick, that you do not want to interfere with it. Much of the arable land of Ireland to-day has half a dozen inches of soil on rock and gravel, which is useless as dairy or cattle land and which, for the last 30 years, has been run out, and can never be made rich. It is no wonder you shied at doing it. You knew the position; but if ever a word was raised, it was raised in connection with land values.

One reason strikes me as being responsible, to a certain extent, for the introduction of this Bill. That is, to put an end to the comparisons between the ratings of to-day and the ratings of 30 or 40 years ago. This Bill will cut right across these comparisons. Valuations will be doubled and we shall be told that the rate is only half what it was. In some counties—Kerry, for instance—the rate is 16/6. There was a time when the rate in Kerry was only 1/2. The Government want to end these comparisons. The Government set up a commission nominally to deal with derating and they loaded it to give the result they wanted. We do not expect any result from that commission. The result we are going to get from it will be nil. I have no faith whatever in it. I was trying to get at the real meaning of the reference to the value of bricks and mortar in connection with this Bill. It strikes me that the idea is to bring the Dublin standard of the value of bricks and mortar down the country. I remember when that standard was represented by the 240 bricks laid by a bricklayer in Dublin. I did my best to cure that. The position is much better to-day. No wonder the value of bricks and mortar should be high at that rate of output. You could not then lay a brick upon a brick in Dublin were it not for State aid and the aid of the local authorities. I doubt if you could lay a brick upon a brick as an economic proposition to-day without State aid and the aid of the local authorities.

Mr. Belton

The time will come for discussing that.

Mr. Gorey

That standard in Dublin will be brought down the country from one end to the other, and houses and buildings, no matter how long they are in existence, will be valued at that standard to suit the Minister's book.

Mr. Belton

That is in the Bill.

Mr. Gorey

That is going to be the standard in the country and, no matter how hard a man may work, if he is able to do the work himself, no matter if he works until 10 o'clock at night on farm buildings, these buildings will be valued according to the Dublin standard. I wonder if country Deputies realise what they are letting themselves in for under this Bill. They are getting no safeguards and they seem to ask for none. Evidence in support of my assertions is given in paragraphs 16 and 17 of the memo which has been furnished in connection with this Bill. Paragraph 16 says:—

In general, therefore, the valuations in the present cadastre are most irrelative for the State as a whole, with the result that the burdens of national and local taxation are distributed unfairly among the individual taxpayers and ratepayers. For this position a general revaluation upon the basis of the true present net annual letting value "one year with another" of each property, as nearly as the same may be estimated, is the only remedy.

That shows that the artificial standard set up in Dublin in respect of bricks and mortar is to be the standard in the country. Paragraph 17 says:—

Obviously it is impracticable to go on down the 20th century valuing houses and buildings upon a basis of 19th century money values. That century has receded into history and a quarter of a century has elapsed even since 1913, and to have any practical acquaintance with the pre-war world a man would need to be more than 40 years of age. The younger men on the staff of the Valuation Office now find themselves endeavouring to value property in terms of a time when they were only children, or even of a time before they were born; and what is true of them is also true of valuers in private practice, of solicitors and of circuit judges.

There is no doubt what the intention is. The intention is to humbug the people. to "put it across them" without their realising it. The whole idea is to try to "cod" the people, to pretend that they are not half as poor as they are. We are told that the Bill is brought forward to increase the credit of the local authorities, to enable them to borrow—in fact, to "cod" the bankers and the money-lending public into the belief that their security has been improved because you send down a horde of officials with instructions to raise the valuations. Because of that, these people are supposed to have better security. The aim of the Government has been to "cod" all the people all the time.

Mr. Belton

It was interesting to hear the Minister, particularly in the concluding passages of his speech on this Bill in which, as mentioned by Deputy Gorey, he suggested that, by increasing the valuation of property, the value of that property as a security is increased. I endorse what Deputy Gorey has said, that this is a deliberate attempt to carry out the policy of "codding" all the people all the time. The Government has succeeded in "codding" a great many people, but this Bill will mark a milestone in its career. I dare say the Minister has been advised that the basis of the Griffith valuation of land was its suitability for growing wheat. Wheat was at a high price at the period of Griffith's valuation. That was long before the Americas had become great wheat-growing areas, long before Russia had come into the wheat market as a supplier of wheat to the wheat-consuming countries of the world, and long before transport had become secure and cheap. There was a great demand for wheat in this country for the feeding of the English people and, consequently, there was a good price for it. The highest valued land in this country was not the rich grazing land, but the wheat-growing land. If the Minister would consult, as he may have consulted, the Department of Agriculture, he would find there in the Statistical Branch elaborate graphs showing the trend in agricultural prices from the early 40's and 50's down practically to the present time. I think the late Tom Barrington, who was head of the Statistical Branch of the Department of Agriculture, was mainly responsible for those graphs and those statistics. I think the Minister will find in them the price of wheat going down and the area of wheat going down, and the price and area are associated. He will find, on the other hand, the price and the numbers of live stock going up, so that the land of to-day for annual valuation purposes would have to be based upon live-stock production.

The Minister pretty wisely, from his own point of view, says we will not touch the land and, for the purpose of the Bill—and remember, the Bill is not to help anybody, but is going to fleece everybody—he says there will be a status quo for the annual poor law valuation of land, but we will increase the value of houses. I think it is pretty plainly stated in the Bill that houses will be increased in valuation according to their letting value, the accommodation they have, and so on. There are many comfortable farmers' houses, small farmers' houses, valued at £1 to 30/-. If these are going to be valued according to the rules laid down in this Bill they might be valued up to £10 or £15. That valuation, without any reduction on foot of the agricultural grant or grants, will leave the farmers' portion of rates higher than they are at the present time.

Mr. MacEntee

May I ask the Deputy a question? I know he is a practical farmer and he knows a great deal about the position generally throughout the country. Does the Deputy think that the valuation of agricultural land will be reduced on a revaluation?

Mr. Belton

It all depends on the angle from which it is looked at.

Mr. MacEntee

The point is that it either has to be revalued or not.

Mr. Belton

If you are to value it from the point of view of net income, yes.

Mr. MacEntee

Is the Deputy certain of that?

Mr. Belton

I am sure of that. Deputy McGovern has raised very technical points and very interesting points. The Minister wants to get away from the money values of the nineteenth century. Is it not an unfortunate time to select in order to fix the valuation? This is a period of money inflation. Money is inflated as highly now as it was during most of the war period. Costs are high because they are based on inflated money values. Deputy McGovern put it to the Minister, and rightly, and I hope the Minister will deal with it when he is replying, that if he wants more equitable valuation and if he wants to get away from the nineteenth century value of money, then he must have a revaluation as soon as money is stabilised here. Whether or not new standards and new values will be put on gold when that stabilisation takes place, I do not know, but you will have to stabilise or revalue the land.

I think it is accepted generally that Griffith's valuation was a fair enough valuation. I think the Minister gave expression to that. I do not think he would question it. So was the Ordnance Survey for the contours of the country. The Minister, as an engineer, knows the significance of the O.D., zr ordnance datum line, and the bench marks throughout the country. These represent the height above sea level of the various places in which you find them. I suggest to the Minister that for valuation purposes Griffith's valuation is a fair enough ordnance datum, so to speak, and if amendments were required—I do not even see that a case has been made for amendments—why not amend them on that base line? Every year it is open for steps to be taken for revision. It is left to rate collectors. In this White Paper submitted by the Minister he says, in effect, they have not been efficient, they have not done their duty.

The Minister is probably aware that at the present time if local authorities do their duty they allow no buildings to go up without sanction. Boards of health throughout the country, the corporation in the City of Dublin and corporations in other cities are the housing authorities and no building can go up without the sanction of the local housing authority. Their by-laws provide for plans being lodged and approved. When those plans are approved and executed and finally reported upon the local authority, through its engineering staff, examines the buildings and the engineers certify that they are fit for the habitation required and are carried out according to specification. With that machinery at his disposal, why should not the Minister get his colleague, the Minister for Local Government, to intervene? When you carry improvements to that point that you know the work is carried out and you have certificates that it has been carried out according to specification and it is suitable for the purposes for which it is intended, why not then pass that on to the commissioner of valuation? If the commissioner of valuation cannot initiate revision, why not a simple Act giving him power to initiate revision with that information at his disposal and let him proceed to revise? I quite understand the Minister's purpose in this matter, but I would have far more respect for the Act, and I think it would be fairer dealing on the part of the Minister, if he put his cards on the table and said: "I want more money from the income-taxpayers of this country and this is my way of getting it." Since the Minister came into office I do not know whether he has taken 6d. off income-tax, but he has not increased income-tax.

Mr. MacEntee

I have. It is 1/- in the £ higher than when I came into office. I am not saying that as a boast.

Mr. Belton

Thanks for the correction. I am not trying to make any point as to the amount in the £, but in another way the Minister has increased taxation on property by 40 per cent. He first of all abolished the one-sixth allowance that, since I knew anything about income-tax, was there for repairs on buildings. In the next year he said:

"Well this is an old valuation, and it is only equitable to increase it by 25 per cent. for income-tax purposes."

I think at that time he said that the time was not far distant when we would have to revise Griffith's valuation. He added, first one-sixth and then one-fourth, to the taxable value and thereby, without having any reference to the rate of income-tax, he increased the income-tax on property by 40 per cent. Now he wants to increase the valuation and he is not doing it fairly even if it is accepted that it should be done.

I do not want to go over the matter again, but we are going through a terrible period of inflation. We are in war conditions now in every respect except in actual fighting and money is regulated by the Bank of England on a war basis. In addition to that, we have had intensive protection here for a number of years. I am not going to deal with the question of protection and the inflated prices which have resulted, particularly in regard to building costs, but it has been stated here, I think by Deputy Cosgrave, that difficulty is experienced by local authorities in raising money for housing—that is, by those local authorities who raise it in the open market. They have been told by representatives of financial and banking interests that the security is not good because of inflated costs and prices. I was on a borrowing mission, representing a local authority, when that was told us across the table. We were told that building costs here were 40 per cent. higher than in Great Britain and we were not able to contradict it. I went into the costs subsequently and the figures were substantially correct. If they erred at all they erred on the light side. That is the standard laid down in this Bill by which, not only houses built in the city, but old farm-houses in the country will be valued.

It is nothing short of audacity to state here, very deliberately and coolly, that because of the shifting of the burden owing to the increased valuation on hereditaments other than land, and because of the increased expenditure that cities and urban populations will bear, the agricultural community will be relieved to that extent. In this matter I can speak with two voices. I have interests both in the city and the county, in industry, building and agriculture, and I know of no clamour for revaluation from any section of the community except one. The farmers in the constituency I represent—County Dublin—have clamoured for years, with increasing intensity, for revaluation, not of their buildings but of agricultural land in County Dublin. When I became interested in agriculture in County Dublin, some 26 or 27 years ago, transport to the Dublin market was by horse and cart. Part of the time I had 20 of them myself on the road. At that time the Dublin market, particularly the vegetable market, was the monopoly of agricultural landowners within a radius of, say, ten miles of the market. Early potatoes alone paid the farmers' outgoings—that is tillage farmers— within that radius. That market to-day is no longer the preserve of the Dublin farmer.

The district where I farmed was within three miles of the G.P.O. Yet, if I sent out a man with two horses and 30 cwt. of potatoes on each cart for the Dublin market, it took him a solid hour to get there. It would still take him a solid hour to get there. Yet, in these days, a man living 30 or 40 miles away can take his six-ton lorry in the morning, hit the road at the same time as my horse and cart, and he will reach the market just as quickly as I can. I think the Minister is aware that land in County Dublin, in close proximity to the city, was valued at a very much enhanced figure by reason of that proximity to the capital. I know from personal experience myself, when I was a respectable civil servant in the Land Commission, that in fixing the price of land there, it was fixed on a common basis for all land— the basis of the judicial rents already fixed. But when the price was being estimated, worked out on the same formula as I say, for Meath, Kildare and Westmeath, then for proximity to Dublin there was 12½ per cent. added. That 12½ per cent. for proximity to Dublin no longer exists. There was a similar proximity value for poor law valuation. That also has gone. Now, those people had a grievance; they had a claim for revaluation, but they are not getting it. The Minister received requests from meetings of the farmers in County Dublin at various times during his career in the county, before he became respectable and went to Rathmines, and I think he always gave a very sympathetic ear to those requests. I hope he has not lost all that sympathy now.

Mr. MacEntee

I think the Deputy is somewhat mistaken.

Mr. Belton

I do not think so. I think the Minister is suffering from a loss of memory.

Mr. MacEntee

I always gave a sympathetic ear to any grievances of my constituents, but if the Deputy wishes to suggest that I promised them at any time——

Mr. Belton

I do not suggest you prompted them.

Mr. MacEntee

If the Deputy wishes to suggest that at any time I promised them revaluation of agricultural land, I think he is wrong.

Mr. Belton

What is sympathetic consideration?

Mr. MacEntee

I said a sympathetic ear.

Mr. Belton

If it is not a promise, it is half the way in any case. I hope that since the Minister ceased to be their representative he has not lost that sympathetic consideration, and now is the time to show it.

Mr. MacEntee

I am listening to the Deputy with the utmost sympathy, but I am not promising him anything.

Mr. Belton

Well, there will be many speeches on this rocky road to Dublin before this Bill, this seven years' plan, works itself out, and I daresay that there will be many deputations even before it passes through its Final Stage and goes to— is it the Upper House or the Lower House?—the other House. Before that happens I hope the Minister will consider the proximity value, that is, if we are so unfortunate as to have this imposition passed into law at all. If it passes into law the Minister should not forget those for whom he had sympathy in years gone by. I agree with Deputy Costello that this is pre-eminently a lawyer's Bill. I followed many careers in my lifetime, but if I were ten years younger I should be inclined to start studying law, there is such a harvest in this Bill for the lawyers.

Mr. MacEntee

The real basis of Deputy Costello's complaint was that we did not codify the law and provide a harvest for the lawyers.

Mr. Belton

Oh, no. He said it was a lawyers' Bill, and that as a lawyer he should like it.

Mr. MacEntee

I know what he is really thinking of.

Mr. Belton

When I put the words into his mouth that it was a lawyers' Bill, well, he fell for it.

Mr. MacEntee

This Bill is based on decided cases, and there are no pickings or very few pickings for the lawyers in this Bill.

Mr. Belton

If the Minister has hoodwinked the lawyers, how easy it will be for him to hoodwink the farmers for whom he had sympathy in years gone by. I have paid lawyers umpteen times, and could never get them to do exactly what I wanted even though I was paying them. They always had some code, or etiquette or something else, and when you had got into their grip you could not get out of it. If the Minister was able to hoodwink them and get out of their grip, the poor farmers will not have much chance. I wonder did it not strike the Minister that if this is not a capital levy it is closely related to it. It is purely inflating the paper value of property in order to extract increased taxation from it. I see no difference between it and a capital levy.

Very interesting lines of argument have been put up here. Deputy Costello put up a very interesting line of argument. Pre-war, the business of house building was carried on for the purpose of renting, and it was a common thing for banks to lend money to builders to build terraces of houses or colonies of houses. It was a common thing, for people who had money to invest, to invest it in house property by purchasing blocks of houses and renting them out to people who wanted houses to rent. Some of them were rented, the tenant paying the rates. More were rented, the owners or landlords as they were called paying the rates. An outcry against that system was raised not by people who were looking for houses, but by people who were in houses. They demanded a tenant right, security in their houses, and they got it. They got something for nothing, and I do not grudge it to them, but they got it at the expense of the rising generation who will be looking for houses to rent. When the landlords or owners of houses, after building or purchasing houses and renting them out on lease or otherwise to tenants, found that those tenants had actually more security in those houses than the owners of the houses, well, that system began to change, until at the present time, as I am sure the Minister is aware, it is the very great exception to get a house to rent at any price. Now, I challenge contradiction of that statement. I have in the last few years built and sold over 400 houses, and the last thing I want is to rent a house at any price. I know dozens of builders in the same position. Why? It cannot be done; there is no business in it. Once a house is let, you cannot borrow any money on it. The banks will not lend money on house property that is let, because it is an endless source of trouble. Even the odd house that is for letting at a rent can only be got at an enhanced rent. I confess that is my outlook and attitude on the matter; I have refused enhanced rents, inflated rents, and held the houses until I sold them, because the legislation which was intended to help the housing tenants had the exact opposite effect. It was useful to those who were in houses, but it deprived another generation from getting houses for rent. I move the adjournment.

Debate adjourned until to-morrow.

The Dáil adjourned at 10.30 p.m. until to-morrow, Friday, at 10.30 a.m.