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The Gazette of the Incorporated Law Society of Ireland.
[AUG.,
1909
Acts from the purview of the new taxes and
their attendant valuations.
The scope of the Land Purchase (Ireland)
Acts, as distinct from the Land Law (Ireland)
Acts, is not limited to agricultural land ; and a
large portion of the lands comprised in the
estates sold thereunder consists of demesne
lands sold for distribution or re-purchase,
residential holdings, holdings adjoining towns,
villages, and other non-agricultural interests
in land. All
these classes of property are
prima facie
liable under the Bill to the Incre
ment Value Duty and the Duty on undeveloped
land, and presumably it will be necessary before
a distribution of the purchase moneys can be
effected to segregate the purchase moneys of
the non-agricultural portions of each estate, to
furnish valuations thereof, and to provide for
the duty (if any) chargeable thereon.
3. The proposed method of exemption of
agricultural land from Increment Duty, not
withstanding the fact that this tax will not be
leviable thereon, will moreover necessitate the
furnishing of valuations at the owner's expense
to the Revenue authorities in order to prove
that agricultural land " has for other purposes
no higher value than its value for agricultural
purposes," and the Council urges on the Irish
Parliamentary Representatives the expediency
of obtaining specific exemption of agricultural
land in Ireland, not only from the Increment
Duty, but also from the Reversion Duty and
the duty on undeveloped land and mineral
rights, and from the unnecessary and costly
valuations entailed by all these taxes.
4. The provision in the Bill that the new
Land Taxes shall take priority to existing in-
cumbrances is inequitable, and express pro
vision should be made rendering these taxes
puisne to incumbrances created prior to the
passing of the Bill.
5. The repeal of the proviso contained in
section 7, sub-section (5), of the Finance Act,
1894, will involve a most serious incre'ase in
the amount of Estate Duty, Settlement Estate
Duty, and Succession Duty payable by the
tenant-farmers of Ireland. Hitherto the assess
ment of the tenant's interest could not exceed
twenty-five times the Poor Law valuation of the
holding, with full deduction for rent or pur
chase annuity, taxes, repairs, and other out
goings, but in future the assessment will be on
the full value of the tenant's interest at its
" normal market price " without any deduction
whatever. At a moderate estimate the effect
will be to render liable to these Death Duties
each year additional property, heretofore un-
taxed, to the value of ^£5,000,000, all of which
additional taxation will have to be borne by
the tenant-farmers of Ireland. The tenant's
interest moreover is not, even when bought
out under the Land Purchase Acts, deemed to
be real estate for the purpose of the Death
Duties, and these heavy duties are payable
under the existing law in a lump sum with
interest from the day of the death and before
a grant of Probate or Administration can be
taken out, in distinction from all other landed
property in every part of the United Kingdom.
6. The doubling of the
ad valorem
duty on
Conveyances of land will weigh with special
severity on
the tenant-farmers of Ireland.
Land in Ireland, particularly under the opera
tion of the Irish Land Acts and the Land
Purchase Acts, is vested in a very large number
of small proprietors, and the purchase of hold
ings or small parcels of land is an usual method
of investment of the savings of the people.
For these reasons and by reason also of the
facilities afforded by the State for registration
of titles, transfers of agricultural land in small
parcels are proportionately more frequent in
Ireland than in other parts of the United King
dom, and in consequence this double stamp
duty will be more often leviable in this country
than elsewhere, and on a class of taxpayers
little able to bear increased taxation.
7. The severity on Irish farmers of the double
Conveyance duty is accentuated by the fact that
on the occasion of a transfer of a farm which
has been purchased under the Land Purchase
Acts the stamp duty on the deed of transfer is
assessed not only on the consideration money
for the purchase, but also on the capitalized
redemption value of the long-term purchase
annuity payable to the Land Commission, which
is added to the actual purchase-money for the
purpose of assessing the duty.
8. The powers given to the Taxing Authori
ties by this Bill to finally determine cases in
which the new land taxes are to be levied, and
the value of the landed property on which these
taxes and the Death Duties are to be assessed,
without appeal to the ordinary courts of the
land are in the highest degree objectionable if
not unconstitutional.
9. The cumulative effect of the new Land
Taxes, the increase in the Death Duties, and
the doubling of the stamp duty on Conveyances
constitutes an undue burden on land, will tend
to a diminution in investments on mortgages
on the security of land and in the purchase of
ground rents and also in the number of trans
fers of holdings, may imperil the punctual