The Gazette 1964/67

VALUATION FOR RATING The "Report on Valuation for Rating Purposes" (Stationery Office 2/-) is the first fruit of the deli berations of a Committee of Officials of the Departments of Agriculture and Fisheries, Educ ation, Finance, Health and Local Government set up by the Minister of the last named Depart ment to examine the system of financing local authorities and to recommend any desirable changes. It is worthy of study both for what it contains and what it portends. Under the Valuation (Ireland) Act, 1852, which envisaged "one uniform valuation of lands and tenements .... for all public and local assessments." Griffith, with the help of the maps produced by the Ordinance Survey, in the years 1853-1865 valued all rateable hereditaments (in cluding buildings, lands, mines, commonage and other profits, railways, canals) in the thirty-two counties, valuing land by its net annual value based on its capacity to yield the then staple crops and agricultural produce, the tenant paying outgoings other than tithe rent charge, and valu ing buildings and other hereditaments by their annual letting value over and above rates, in surance and maintenance. Complaint has been made that Griffith's valuations of land, admirable in meticulous attention to every detail affecting value in accordance with the formula chosen, did not achieve the desired uniformity because standards varied as experience was gained and because the valuations of the counties surveyed in the early years reflected the chaotic condition of agriculture immediately following the Famine. By Section 34 of the Act of 1852 a County Council and by Section 65 of the Local Govern ment Act, 1898 a County Borough may apply for a general revision of valuation of all property in the jurisdiction. Few such applications were made, but Dublin was revalued in 1908-1915 on the basis of 1913-14 rental values less 10 per cent resulting in a 15 per cent increase in valuations; Waterford was revalued in 1924-26 on such rental values without deduction of 48 per cent increase effected; in 1946 building in built-up areas of County Galway were revalued at 1914 letting values, which were about a third of those ruling at the time of revision and valuations increased by 52 per cent in Galway City, by 18 per cent in Tuam, by 12 per cent in Ballinasloe, whilst a similar general revision in Buncrana gave a 50 per cent increase in the total valuation of that Urban District. Since there has been no general revaluation of the country and the "annual re- 68

vision," now to be mentioned, does not apply to land, in general, land in the State still holds Griffith's valuation of over a century ago. The Commissioner of Valuation can revise no valuation of his own accord, but rating authorities must submit annual lists of tenements and here ditaments the valuation of which require revision, their collectors having a duty to furnish the necessary information. From the revision effected in consequence a "first appeal lies to the Com missioner himself, and from his decision a "second appeal" goes to the Circuit Court. The Report complains that collectors were not too assiduous in the discharge of this unpopular duty, and that in practice buildings were rarely listed for revision save when they necessarily came to the notice of the local authority because they were new or because a planning permission was sought, or a loan or reconstruction grant made in respect of them. Notwithstanding lack of zeal for re vision, the Committee calculates that more than half the 676,000 houses in the State have been revalued in the past thirty years. In these annual revisions, successive Commis sioners of Valuation encountered first the general rise in the value of property at the end of the last century and then the steep increases due to two world wars. Revaluing current values would have created a sharp disparity between the valu ation of properties revalued and those not re valued, and consequently the Commissioner "made deductions to make relative," in other words scaled down his valuation—until 1947 under the influence of the Rent Restrictions Acts on the basis of the estimated 1914 rent—in an attempt to relate it fairly to other similar pro perty in the neighbourhood. Since 1947 the Com missioner has valued unrented buildings at 3 per cent to 4 per cent of their capital value and rented buildings at one-third of their reasonable current rent, ignoring inflated capital value or rent due to post war conditions. The net result of lack of revision in respect of land and of partial revision on different prin ciples in respect of buildings is that valuations are often out of date, frequently inconsistent and ir relative and consequently inequitable as between one rate or taxpayer and another. The Com missioner complained too, that the appeal decis ions of Circuit Court Judges have resulted in dis proportion between the valuations of different types of property in the same area and between the same types of property in the same area and between the same types of property in different areas.