TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE GOVERNMENT AND LOCAL TAXATION.
THE country is evidently waking up on the subject of Local Taxation. Two years ago, it was a topic for philanthropic meetings and the debates of Statistical Societies ; last year Mr. Dyke Acland, though warmly applauded for a speech on county rates, could effect nothing ; while to-day the House of Commons seems inclined to force the question upon Government, and accept any proposal, provided only it goes far enough. The only real objection alleged against Mr. Goschen's Bill for the equalization of London assessments is that it is not strong enough, that the Assessor who is to be appointed to compel fairness need not be embarrassed by a representative Council, and the curious mistake made by the House on Tuesday night was due to the influence of the same spirit. Sir Massey Lopes wanted a Royal Commission of inquiry into the taxation of counties, and Mr. Goschen wanted to say that Government had got past that point, meant action, and not only inquiry. Mr. Goschen, however, has a trick of understating alike his own case and his own determination, and the House was so eager for decision, so longing for vigour, so thirsty for positive pledges, that the Premier had to get up and rescue his colleague by saying exactly the same thing, without one jot or tittle of difference, in a different tone. He did it very well, too, with something of Lord Palmerston's spirit when defending a colleague. The precise state of the entire question as revealed in the two debates is, wo believe, this. The Government is fully convinced that local taxation has begun from various causes to interest the people, even more than the Imperial taxes, which now press very lightly on the most numerous class of the electorate ; is satisfied that considerable reforms are practicable or possible, and has charged the Poor Law Board with the collection of all the data necessary to considerable proposals. As no groat change is possible without reference to the Exchequer or without full inquiry by the Premier, this arrangement is equivalent, as Mr. Ward Hunt happily said, to the appointment of a Royal Commission consisting of the Government itself, a Commission which has this advantage, that when it reports it also begins to legislate. It might begin this year, for the information collected must already be very great, and the President of the Poor Law Board has a power of devising plans which the House will one day perceive, as two successive Cabinets have done ; but the Irish Church stops the way, and in face of that immense question, immense in the work it will involve as well as in the results it may produce, the Government must content itself with the preparatory steps on which parties are tolerably agreed.
Among these is a uniform basis for rating in the Metropolis. It is quite certain that before long, that is within three years, the House must consider whether it will or will not equalize rates throughout the Metropolis, and Mr. Goschen on Monday hinted very clearly that Her Majesty's Government is inclined to the affirmative view. As a matter of justice, we cannot allow West London to grow for ever richer through the labour of East London, yet reject all share in the burdens East London has to bear ; as a matter of local policy, we cannot for ever exempt the educated, the wealthy, and the powerful from any responsibility in the taxation of the poorer quarters of their own city; and as a matter of national safety, we cannot for ever go on heaping rates upon the poor while the rich are comparatively exempt. It is all very well to suggest palliatives, but when an East-End greengrocer pays rates on a rent equal to half his whole profits, and a West End doctor on a rent equal to a tenth of his receipts, taxation must not be carried too far, or there will be resistance. Pending, however, any general reform, which will involve terrible questions, such as the moral liability for the relief of the poor, the political liability, and the legal liability, together with the actual incidence of taxation, it is possible to pave the way for much greater measures by equalizing the bases of calculation. It is of no use to say every Londoner shall pay 3s. 4d. on his rental, if the parishioners of St. Judas can decree that a half or quarter of the true rent shall be accepted as rental for the purposes of the Act. This is what happens now. St. Judas, being rich, and having few poor, lowers its assessment, i.e., its legal valuation, as far as it dares. Of course, its poor-rate is nominally higher, needs more pence in the pound ; but it is not really higher, while all general rates are actually very much lower. The Marquis of Hampshire, say, with a house worth £1,000 a year, poor-rates of 6d., and general rates of
2s., ought to pay £125 a year. But if he is assessed at £500, his poor-rate will be ls., his general rate as before, and his
total payment £75, very little more than half. This is, of course, a very extreme case ; but Mr. Goschen quoted an instance of a house assessed for house duty by the Exchequer, and, therefore, it is to be presumed, fairly assessed, at £600 a year, while its occupier was paying poor-rate and county-rate on only £370 ; and much smaller variations than that spread over whole parishes will make a vast difference in the returns. There are twenty parishes which under local Acts can, if so disposed, play almost any trick they like about assessment,
and we only wonder that under the system they are as fair as they have been. This anomaly must be redressed before any
thing larger can be done, and it will be redressed by Mr. Goschen's measure, which has evidently the support of both sides of the House. He did not quote in his speech the system of valuation he has approved, and, indeed, it does not matter greatly, so long as it is alike for all. If it is high, the rate per pound will be low ; if it is low, the rate will be high. Proprietors prefer the fo1mer, because it diminishes discontent with their rents ; and occupiers, if they were wise, would prefer the latter, because people are more frightened at additional pennies on the rates than additional pounds on the assessment, but it does not really matter. What does matter, is equality ; and Mr. Goschen, we think, secures equality by giving the parishes a right of pleading against each other before an Assessor, who ought to be a high-class judge, a man like Sir Barnes Peacock, with parochial law and facts at his fingers' ends, and something else besides. Whether a representative Council is also required the House of Commons must decide. We do not see, we confess, of what use Essence of Vestry can be in such a matter, and should greatly prefer that the Assessor should report to the Poor-Law Board, which should then carry out the decree. The point, however, is the creation of a power which can settle quarrels as to equality, and this is effectually done by the Bill, and done on a scheme which may when finally settled be extended to all England. The Times, indeed, seems to think the Assessor,—why on earth that absurd name for a great office I—will be far too powerful a person ; but if he is made only to report like a Bribery Judge, it is the PoorLaw Board which will order, and the Board is amenable to the House of Commons on any evening.
We are not disposed to disown a strong regret that theGovernment is postponing everything to the Irish difficulty, on which, as it seems to us, the nation has pronounced. It is vexatious to people not wholly devoted to ecclesiastical subjects to see matters like local taxation and primary education postponed to a question which, great as it is, is one of detail only, the principle having been decided by a plebiscitum ; but the conduct of public business must be left to Government, and if postponement is needful, the mode of postponement selected is by far the most honest. As Mr. Goschen said, nothing would have been easier than for him to " hang up " the discussion by assenting to a Royal Commission, which would have done his work for him, and nothingelse. It would have collected masses of information which the Board could collect at half the expense, but could not have decided any one of the half-dozen questions at the root of. the difficulty. For example, the Chambers of Agriculture are all saying, and the county members are very likely to say, that fixed property ought not to pay the whole of the rates. They may be wrong or they may be right, but at all events they say that, and till that point is decided nothing effective can be done. Is a Royal Commission to decide that, which is as absolutely a matter of public policy as a war, and so assume Legislative power of the highest order ? Why, the House of Commons would not on such a matter even read their report, much less pay any attention to it ; and the Government would be able to say, on a question directly involving confidence, " We are not responsible. This is not our view, but that of the Commission." Even on the scientific side of the matter a Commission could effect very little. It is, for example, we believe, a fact that the incidence of rates is not absolutely the same everywhere ; that the landlord in some places pays the whole of them,—as, for instance, in the " Legal district " of London, where rents could be forced up to almost any figure, and where if the rates were abolished to-morrow no occupier would save sixpence ;—and in some places, competition for occupancies being limited, pays only part. A Commission could, we dare say, arrive at the exact truth of that perplexing difficulty ; but so can the economists within the House, which, besides including great financiers, includes men who know where every parish shoe pinches. The Government, plus the departments, plus the
squires, plus the economists, plus the metropolitan members, know quite as much as any Commission, and can act, which a Commission cannot do. As they intend to act,—both the Premier and the President having distinctly pledged themselves to that,—the sensible and the honest mode of action is to inquire for themselves, and the moment this lumbering ecclesiastical procession is out of the way, to step forward with their views. As we understand the debate, this is what Government proposes to do, and the country folk are in fact assured that their special grievance, so far from being " hung up," is already a matter of Cabinet concern. If they are in a hurry, they have only to put their shoulders to the wheel of the Irish caravan, which just now blocks the way.
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