In fixing the judicial rent of Lord Lansdowne's Queen's- County
estates last week, the Sub-Commissioner, Mr. Kane, reduced every rent but one, one or two about 25 per cent, some 20 per cent., sonic of them 16 per cent., some as little as 8 or 9 per cent., but all, with one exception, substantially. This is the more remarkable because, as we believe, the new revision of rent by the Court has completely borne out Mr. Gladstone's statement that the greater Irish proprietors were not asking too high a rent, and would not be affected by the Land Act. It will appear, we believe, that a very considerable number of tenants under the great landowners have never applied to the Court at all for a judicial rent, and for the best possible reason,—be- cause they were quite as likely to have had their rents raised by the Court as to have had them reduced. Lord Lansdowne, how. ever, is not in this position. It appears, for example, that in some instances he borrowed money from the State at 3i per cent., lending it to his tenants at 5 per cent., and his agent admitted that the margin ought to be regarded as a sinking fund by which the debt was to be extinguished. We wish the Land Commissioners would issue maps of Ireland, showing the districts which have never been brought into Court at all in any way, and those which have been re-settled under the Act. We believe that such a map would be found to bear out completely all that the Government said as to the larger proprietors in Ireland.
Previous page
