When speaking against this Bill, when it was previously before the House, I was going on to consider the basis of previous valuations. Griffith's valuation was based as valuations always are, on the real prices of a series of crops. The index figures were based on that. There is nothing in this Bill to indicate that this valuation will be carried out on these lines. It will be interesting to hear the Minister explain that point because, from my reading of the Bill, the meaning I take out of it is, that there are just certain things that have to be considered and a decision come to, and that once that decision is made, all the rest follows. Outside the Boroughs of Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Waterford and Dun Laoghaire, agricultural land will not be revalued, but agricultural and other buildings will be revalued. The method of approach to valuing these agricultural buildings is their worth in the businesses in which they are used. I wonder what is the worth to a dairyman of a modern dairy shed that cost £1,000. If we reckon 5 per cent. for the money, as I read the Bill, that shed cannot be valued at less than £50 a year. Surely it will be more. No man is going to put up a structure that is worth nothing but the interest on the capital invested. It would not pay to do so. As I read this Bill, that is the minimum value that can be put on them.
In regard to old buildings standing, are they to be valued on the cost of renewal, or are they to be valued on the use of the buildings, or how are they to be valued? No matter how they are valued, their Poor Law Valuation will come up from two to three times what it is at the present time and, without the valuation of the lands being touched, the value of the holding, buildings and land combined, will be twice what it is at the present time. Considering that all interested parties had the right to move for a revaluation every year, I think the whole case is met without putting the country to this cost.
Of course, there is just one thing in it and that is probably the major inducement, particularly to the Government and particularly to the Minister for Finance, that is, to increase the valuation for income-tax purposes. We have just been discussing housing and the building of houses for renting. Everybody knows that that is not a business proposition to-day. Twenty or 30 years ago it was. Nobody is investing money now in house property for letting purposes, for reasons that we need not go into, but the tendency will be still less in future to invest money in houses for renting purposes.
Take a house, of a valuation of £20, within the metropolitan area of Dublin, let at 30/- a week, £78 a year. Disregarding the remission of rates that there may be on that house, and paying full rates on it at the present time of 19/6, say £1, that would be £20. With a few shillings insurance, stipulated in this Bill, the rates are the total outgoings. Take £20 off £78 and you have £58. According to the formula set out in this Bill, the dwelling-house that to-day is valued at £20 must be valued under this Bill in future at £58 or, if a few pounds are allowed, although I do not think it is mentioned in the Bill, for income-tax, it will be valued at £52 or £53. The valuation of private dwelling-houses in Dublin is going to be increased two and a half times, as I read the Bill. Of course, that, at 4/6 in the £, will enable the Minister to tell us once more, in his annual address, that his finances are buoyant. But, who is paying for it?
Now, let us consider people who are renting houses. If they have a house on which they had to pay income-tax at the rate of £20 valuation, and have it let at £X a year, they find they have to pay 4/6 in the £ on an increase of £30 or £32. Are they going to continue renting those houses at 30/- a week and, if they must, will they, or will any other people, invest their money in Irish house property so as to rent those houses to people who are unable to buy houses but who would be able to rent them? It will end entirely the renting of houses. I would like to hear the Minister explain that a little.
I am glad to see one County Dublin Deputy here and I hope he will consider his constituents vis-a-vis other constituents in Éire in connection with this Revaluation Bill. There are exemptions here of agricultural land, but, in the Borough of Dublin and the Borough of Dun Laoghaire there will be no exemption. There is before the Minister for Local Government at the present time the report of a tribunal set up by him to consider the local administration of County Dublin, the City of Dublin, the Borough of Dun Laoghaire and smaller areas within the geographical County of Dublin. This tribunal sat for a year or two, two or three years ago, and it has reported and recommended. The recommendation, broadly, is that the whole of County Dublin be included in the county borough. So that, we have no reason to doubt that that will be implemented, probably without any change, unless the country wakes up and finds that it is time to get rid of this Government because the recommendations of that tribunal have no relation whatever to the evidence that was put before the tribunal. It would suggest a preconceived notion of local administration for the whole of County Dublin. However, that may come before the House in its own form as a principal subject matter some day before it will be imposed and I do not want to discuss it in detail. I only introduce it here and develop it a little, first of all, in order to put before the House in relation to this Bill that is before the House the recommendations embodied in that report and the likelihood of those recommendations being implemented. If they are implemented, then the agricultural land of County Dublin must be valued because it comes within the County Borough or the Borough of Dun Laoghaire. There will be no Borough of Dun Laoghaire then. It will be all the County Borough of Dublin and the agricultural land of County Dublin will be revalued. According to the formula set out here, how would that work out? It appears to me, as I read this Bill, that the basis on which the Minister goes is the basis of the old rack-renting landlord of 80 or 90 years ago; that the last penny that can be squeezed out of the land is the rent and the rent is the value which the worker of that land should have to pay the rack-renting landlord. Our modern rack-renter, the Minister for Finance, gives the same definition of income in this Bill, so that an inflated 11 months' rent for the land of County Dublin will be considered the poor law valuation, less certain outgoings, and that will treble the present poor law valuation. As I explained when I was last speaking on this Bill, motor transport has destroyed the proximity value of County Dublin land, and County Dublin will then be in the unique and unenviable position of being the only county in Ireland the agricultural land of which will be revalued under this Bill. I hope the Deputies in County Dublin who sit on the Government Benches and who fooled the poor old farmers in County Dublin will now get up and defend them.