SECOND REPORT FROM THE EPISCOPAL AND CAPITULAR REVENUES COMMISSIONERS. Presented to both Houses of Parliament by Command of Her Majesty. PRINTED BY GEORGE EDWARD EYRE AND WILLIAM SPOTTISWOODE, SECOND REPORT. TO THE QUEEN'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY. WE, Your Majesty's Commissioners appointed by a Commission bearing date the 8th day of January 1849 for the purpose of inquiring into Episcopal and Capitular Estates and Incomes in England and Wales, humbly present to Your Majesty this our Second Report. In our First Report we stated that we had endeavoured to apply to the manors, house property, and mines belonging to the Church, principles analogous to those therein recommended with regard to the management of farms and lands, but that in consequence of the difficulties which presented themselves we deemed it expedient to reserve the question as to the management of those kinds of property for further consideration. We have since applied ourselves specially to this branch of our inquiry, and we now submit to Your Majesty the following observations and suggestions thereon. Manors and Manorial Lands. Manors are frequently included in leases for lives and years; the lessees, who in some parts of England, especially the southern and western counties, are styled "lords farmers," keeping the courts, and having vested in them all the rights and privileges of the lords during the continuance of their leases. Many manors also belonging to the Church are "in hand," the bishop or other dignitary, as the case may be, retaining the lordship. Of the manorial lands, some are copyholds for lives and some of inheritance, and are subject to the payment to the lords of quit rents and fines (either arbitrary or certain) on renewal, death, or alienation, and are liable in some cases to heriots also; all the lands being held by copy of court roll, and dealt with according to the custom of the manor in which they are locally situate. We do not feel ourselves justified in recommending the same indulgence to be allowed to the lessees of manors as we have advised with respect to other estates belonging to the Church, such lessees having, in our opinion, no claims on account of capital expended or improvements effected upon the property. We think, therefore, that leases of manors, especially those in the hands of lords farmers, should not be renewed, but that such leases should either be run out, or the manors sold, according to the judgment of the Central Board, as might seem to them most expedient for the interests of the Church. Exceptions should however be made, and the lessees should be entitled to renewal in cases where the manors are held in connexion with mines or demesne lands, which should be dealt with upon the same principles as are recommended in our former Report with respect to farms and lands. We think also that the copyhold and customary tenure of manorial lands should be as soon as possible extinguished; the copyholds for lives being in some cases, at the discretion of the Central Board, treated as leaseholds for lives, and in other cases, together with the copyholds of inheritance, enfranchised; all monies to be received by way of purchase money or for enfranchisement being invested as advised in our former Report. We further recommend, that in all future enfranchisements of copyholds for lives, the practice of exchanging the lives before enfranchisement should either be discontinued or, otherwise, that the fines taken for such exchanges should be treated as capital, and invested. House Property and Building Land. The house property belonging to the dignitaries of the Church appears, generally speaking, to be let upon leases for twenty-one, thirty, or forty years, or for three lives, and some is let at rack rent. There is also much valuable house property and building land let for long terms of years, either under special Acts of Parliament, or the Leasing Act referred to in our former Report. The amounts of the fines paid on the renewals of the leases vary in different dioceses. With respect to the forty years leases, ordinarily renewed every fourteen years, the fines are in some places only three quarters of a year's fineable value, and in other places one year's value, or a year and a half's value. In this last case the fine is not far from the true value of the reversionary term of fourteen years for which it is paid. We propose to apply to these usually renewable leases of houses the same principle which we have proposed in our First Report with respect to leases of farms and lands, but with the modifications which appear to us to be required by the nature of the property. We suggest that in consideration of an additional annual rent, to be paid by the lessee, the right of perpetual renewal at the existing rate of fine be secured to the lessee, and that new valuations should take place, not at each period of renewal, but every twenty-first year. The additional annual rent should be determined as follows: 1. The value of the dry term of the lessee (i. e. his term without any right or expectation of renewal) should be ascertained. 2. The value of the term with the right of perpetual renewal at the usual rate of fine should likewise be estimated. 3. The lessee should be charged with an additional rent calculated on half the difference of these values. Considering that this additional rent will be a well-secured rent, five per cent. on the above-mentioned half difference will be sufficient. In illustrating this recommendation by examples it should be borne in mind that the fee simple of house property seldom exceeds 16 years' purchase, yielding an interest of six per cent., and accordingly in the following examples the value of partial or reversionary interests in the property is estimated at the like rate of interest, though in practice a higher rate of interest would probably be allowed in the calculations. Example Example 2.-The same circumstances are assumed as in example 1., but the fine only one year's purchase, or 100%. Consequently the annual payment equi 9l. 9s. Od. 90l. 11s. Od. =1,300l. Os. Od. The difference Half the difference =1,5091. 3s. 4d. -= 2091. 3s. 4d. Example 3.-The same circumstances as in example 1., but the fine only three quarters of a year's purchase, i.e. 75l. Consequently the annual payment equi valent to the fine The annual value beneficially enjoyed by 71. 28. |