CHAPTER XLII.

TENANT RIGHT.

BY WILLIAM E. BEAR,

Author of The British Farmer and his Competitors," "The Relations of Landlord and Tenant," etc.

NOTHING would more effectually encourage agricultural enterprise, and so conduce to the advantage of all classes connected with land, than an Act of Parliament securing fair and adequate compensation to tenants for actual improvements to their holdings. Except as "a homily to landlords," the Agricultural Holdings Act has proved a failure. It has been only beneficial so far as it has induced landlords and tenants to make satisfactory arrangements by private contract in order to avoid the risks of coming under its provisions, which are more conducive to costly litigation than to a fair settlement of the respective claims of landlords and tenants. In the great majority of cases tried under the Act, the tenant has put in an extravagant claim, the landlord has retorted by the production of an equally unfair counter-claim, and the umpire or judge has "split the difference," awarding so little balance to either party that it has been about swallowed up in costs. Proposals have been made for the amendment of the Act; but it is too hopelessly bad in construction for effective amendment. It was so framed as to allow of its administration upon

a wrong principle-that of payment for expenditure; for although the first section provides that compensation for improvements shall be measured by their value to an incoming tenant, less "what is due to the inherent capabilities of the soil," valuers have almost, if not quite, universally based their allowances upon outlay. As respects the landlord's counter-claim, too, the Act encourages demands for infringement of covenants, independently of actual waste or deterioration, and tenants have actually been fined heavily for cropping irregularities which were clearly advantageous to the landlords or succeeding occupiers. The proper principle to govern counter-claims, as to rule claims, is that of payment for results. In short, the tenant should have a legal claim to any addition to the value of his holding effected by his improvements; while the landlord should be able to demand an indemnity for any deterioration in its value due to the tenant's faults, mistakes, or neglect.

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When the Agricultural Holdings Act was under discussion, great efforts were made to alter its principle and its details. But landlords were unnecessarily afraid of payment for results, and strongly and successfully opposed its effective embodiment in the Bill. By means of the simple proviso of barring results due to "the inherent capabilities of the soil," which no man measure, they destroyed the nominal principle of compensation in proportion to value to an incoming tenant. Valuers would not face "inherent capabilities," and got out of the difficulty as already stated. The result is that, while landlords succeeded in preventing tenants. from getting any considerable payment for improvements, they also stopped the inducement to improvement which, if they had been wise, they would have encouraged. In effect, the tenants' claims were limited and handi

capped, while the landlords' counter-claims were entirely unlimited. In a paper read before the London Farmers' Club, Mr. C. S. Read clearly showed how unfair many of the landlords' counter-claims have been, and how foolish it was for any tenant to have anything to do with the Agricultural Holdings Act. It is, of course, impossible to gauge the advantages which that measure has, as a kind of scarecrow, secured to tenants. Agreements made in order to avoid it have probably, in some cases, been such as to encourage agricultural enterprise. Directly, however, the Act is of no appreciable advantage in this direction. The improvements which it allows tenants to make, with a claim to compensation, without their landlord's consent, are just such. temporary improvements as all decent farmers make without any legal encouragement. It may be that, in the last year of a tenancy, a farmer here or there has used cake or artificial manure more freely than he would have used it if there had been no Act of the kind. This, however, is not of much account. The Act fails to stimulate the steady and continuous enrichment of land, and the execution of permanent improvement, because it is so administered that it does not recognize anything but bills for feeding stuffs and fertilizers, and it allows no claims for permanent improvements unless the landlord's consent to their execution was obtained. It is true that a tenant may drain land, after giving notice, if the landlord will not do the work, and claim compensation for what is deemed the unexhausted proportion of his outlay; but I have not heard of a single instance in which this doubtful privilege has been embraced. The privilege, or right, is that of a tenant to say to his landlord, "I shall drain this land if you will not, and claim compensation." The mere necessity of having thus to "fly in the face" of

his landlord is sufficient to deter any tenant from using this right, unless he and the owner of his holding are already on bad terms, or unless he holds under a long lease and is prepared to leave at its expiration; and as to this last point, it is to be observed that most leases bar the Act. Moreover, the assertion of the right can be easily checkmated by a notice to quit, for no tenant would take the trouble to drain land unless he expected several years of occupancy in his holding. Draining is such a necessary improvement, where it is required. at all, that every tenant should be entitled to execute it if his landlord will not do the work instead. The tenant should not be paid a penny if the draining has not been a real improvement, whether because it was not needed, or because it has not been properly done. But where it has reclaimed water-logged land, and made it sound and sweet for all kinds of crops, he should receive the full value of its increment in value.

Then, take the case of a tenant laying down land in permanent pasture. Good pasture always adds to the letting value of an ordinary farm, and landlords must have gained, as a rule, by a law affording security to tenants' capital invested in the making of such pasture. The condition of the pasture would clearly show whether it was a real improvement or not, for it would not thrive on soils or in districts not suitable to it; yet a tenant is not entitled to a penny of compensation for the best of pasture laid down without his landlord's consent.

We have all heard and read a great deal of late as to the desirability of growing more fruit in this country, but how can tenant-farmers be expected to incur the great expense of planting land with fruit trees or bushes without any security? A fruit farm would never long lack a tenant, but would let readily at a good rent. Then why

should not tenants be encouraged to plant fruit trees and bushes if their landlords do not feel disposed, or are not able, to do the work when occupiers desire to go into the business of fruit-growing? The Act, however, bars compensation for the planting of orchards or fruit bushes, unless the landlord's consent is obtained. It is the same with the making of gardens or fences, the reclaiming of waste land, and other highly desirable permanent improvements.

It is true that there might be some hardship in requiring a landlord to provide a large sum of money to compensate a quitting tenant for a number of costly permanent improvements, and for that reason I have on previous occasions proposed that he should be entitled to leave the tenant to get compensation by selling the improvements to a future tenant. In my opinion the right of free sale of improvements is by far the best form of tenant-right for all parties concerned; but this has been commonly objected to, because it involves a valuation of rent. The Ulster system worked well for landlords and tenants alike, so far as it was carried out in its integrity, and not unfairly hampered by "estate rules." It was far more equitable than the Irish Land Acts are, for they are in some respects unjust to landlords; but if objections be raised to such a system for universal application, what harm could be done by giving landlords the option of paying their quitting tenants compensation for improvements, or allowing them to sell these improvements in the open market? Improved farms always let readily, even in the worst of times, and although, if tenants obtained the full value of their improvements, landlords would not get for nothing enhanced rents upon those improvements, it would be no slight advantage to have farms always in such order as to be readily lettable.