THE IRISH LAND BILL.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR.1
SIR,—I cannot allow some of your remarks in the Spectator of November 28th on Irish land affairs to pass without comment. With regard to the amounts said by Mr. Birrell to be required, you ignore Mr. Wyndham's reply that the calculations for the Land Act of 1903 did not include vast sums for purchasing some of the most valuable land in Ireland, which the Govern- ment of the time did not think of buying or the owners of selling. Lots of owners, perhaps most of them, would rather not have sold their estates; but when their tenants found their purchased neighbours paying largely reduced amounts, how long do you.suppose it would have been before there was a universal "no rent" campaign, and, once started, how much help would the landlords have got from the Government in collecting rents on such a scale ? As to the price, what " previous market value" do you allude to ? For many years past there was no market for the landlord to sell in owing to inter- ference with his contracts by successive English Governments elected by English taxpayers. It was to meet that difficulty that the bonus was proposed, not without assurances that the economy in governing the country, once landlords were expro- priated, would largely cover the amount required for the bonus. Is it the fault of the landlords or the taxpayers of England that it has so far been impossible to carry out the economies? With regard to the landlord being able to wait for his money, which you put in a very cruel way, you perhaps may not remember that no interest is paid on the bonus, which is in many cases all that is left to the landlord to live on, and which was at any rate in 1903 looked upon as part of the value of his property, so that he has a right to expect it. I may give you our experience of the " greatly increased security" of having your rents collected by the Commis- sioners. Last summer, after waiting for over two months, and receiving no answers to applications to know when we should get any income, I had to go to the expense of going up to Dublin myself, and after spending two and a half hours in the various offices of the Commissioners, was able to prove to them that our Co. Waterford business had all been shoved into the Co. Wexford, and was waiting there for a non-existing owner to write and ask for his money. Com- missioner Wrench admitted to me the grossest carelessness on the part of the office. For the past half-year we know the bulk of the interest was paid before November 14th, and only after two unacknowledged applications from the agent and one stiff letter from me, registered, did a small instalment of some of it arrive on the 2nd of this month. Would you like to have your business put practically compulsorily into such bands, and be calmly told that you could wait for your money while your mortgagees clamour for their interest, and your labour bills have to be met every week unless you dismiss your labourers and add to the unemployed ? I have still that much faith in the English people that I believe, if they could only understand what has been going on here for years past, it would not be tolerated for a moment. Any one that I speak to about it when in England can hardly believe that even the little I can tell is possible.—I am, Sir, &c.,
M. FAIRHOLDIE.
Comragh, Kilmacthomos, Co. Waterford.
{Mr. Fairholme certainly seems to have been treated with gross injustice. Whatever a Government have agreed to pay should be paid, and as punctually as the Government insist that payments due to the State shall be made. Let us say again that we would carry out all existing bargains to the letter. The fall in the price of Government stock, and the consequent rise in the rate at which Government can borrow, seem to us good ground for altering the arrangements under which the purchase money shall be raised in the future. If the terms have to be a little less good, the loss must be divided between the vendor and purchaser.—En. Spectator.]
Previous page
