The Sun.
London, England, 1860-01-31 00:00:00

SUPPLY.

On the bringing up of the report of the motion for sup-
1p
The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER,. in reply
to hon. members, said that from the returns received from
the War Department, the excess of expenditure over the
amount voted in the estimates would be about £470,000.
ST. MARY IN RYDAL (MARRIAGE VALIDITY)
BILL.
This bill was read a second time.
PETITIONS OF RIGHT BILL.

Theecond reading of this bill was postponed.
ANNUITY TAX ABOLITION (EDINBURGH).

The LORD ADVOCATE moved that this house do re-
solve itself into a committee for the purpose of introducing
a bill to abolish the annuity tax in Edinburgh, and to make
provision in regard to the stipends of the clergy in that city.
The house having gone into committee,

The LORD ADVOCATE said that the subject had been
often'under the consideration of the house, and a short state-
ment only would be necessary of the provisions of the bill. '
As the house had been often told, the annuity tax was a
rate amounting to 41 per cent. upon the rental of houses 1
within a certain limited area of the city, and which was laid
upon the occupiers of those houses, the proceeds being
paid to 18 ministers of Edinburgh. He must also explain
that the congregations covered a much larger area than the
districts taxed. Nor did the tax extend to all the occupiers,
inasmuch as there was a special exemption of a large and
wealthy class, consisting of members of faculty, judges,
barristers, and solicitors. Without entering into the ques-
tion whether the principle of this taxation was right or
wrong, no one could deny that it was very unjust in the
mode of its imposition. Several plans for modifying it
had been introduced into the house, and he would now pro-
ceed with a new attempt in the same direction. His hon.
friend and colleague the member for Edinburgh had twice
introduced a measure, which on both occasions had received
the assent of the house on the second reeding. By the pro-
visions of those bills the ministers of Edinburgh, when the
last vacancy had occurred, would be dependent on seat-
rents, church-door collections, and a sum of £2,000, which
was drawn from the Exchequer, being part of a rent-charge
levied from the City of Leith. That proposal had twice re-
ceived the sanction of the house. Therefore, the question
was not now as to the continuance of the tax, or its aboli-
tion, but upon what terms and conditions it:should be abo-
lished. His proposal was not the same as the bill of last ses-
sion. The result of that bill, if carried, would have been
that for 15 years the citizens of Edinburgh would have been
subjected to a payment of £3 7s. 4d. per cent. The tax would
have gone on for 16 years longer-31 years in all—and after
the payment of £3 7s. 4d. per cent.for 15years, there would
have been a further total sum paid of £63,000, so that the
burden would not have been extinguished tor a very consi-
derable period. In the present year two contingencies had
occurred. One of the ministers had been appointed to
a professorship, and another had been translated to another
benefice. These contingencies might happen in years to
come, but they were things that could not be calculated on.
The proposal of last year, leaving the clergy to a great ex-
tent dependent on voluntary contributions, would in all pro-
bability have met with very strong opposition. It occurred
to him that their tine and money might be used with more
economy ; and the proposal he had now to make would at
once relieve the ratepayers of Edinburgh, extinguish the
tax in a more limited period, and provide an equitable and
just substitute. Formerly there was a fund, payable by the
railway company, as the price of Trinity College Church.
A committee which sat in 1851 recommended that it should
be applied in extinguishing this tax; but a law suit had
arisen as to the right of the town council to deal with this
money, and it was not now available. There was also a
sum payable to the deans of the Chapel Royal, which it had
been proposed to apply to this purpose ; but these funds
also were now beyond reach, the University Commissioners
having recommended that they should be applied in endowing
more professorships. The third source was Government
money, but he was happy to say he did not propose to have
recourse to that. His proposition was one by which the citi-
zens of Edinburgh would be enabled to redeem the tax ; and
at all events it contained the materials for an amicable set-
tlement of the question. Great scandal resulted from the pre-
sent mode of collecting the tax. The other day there was a trial
for resisting the officers in the execution of their warrants, in
which the prosecutor failed to get a verdict ; and it was most
desirable that the question should be settled. At present the
ministers were 18 in number. Three of the churches were
collegiate. It appeared to him that they were not bound to
provide for the second charges in those collegiate churches.
He did not propose to abolish one of them ; but in providing
a substitute for the annuity tax, and providing for existing
interests, he did not think that it would be necessary to pro-
vide for those second interests ; and that opinion was shared
by many members of the Established Church. That would
leave 15 ministers—a larger proportion for Edinburgh than
was provided for in other towns. Ho thought it too
much. He wished to say nothing invidious against the
Established Church; but still his measure was a practical
one. In 1837, when the Ecclesiastical Commissioners re-
ported, the attendance at the Established Churches of Edin-
burgh was very nearly equal to that of all other denomina-
tions put together. In 1843 there WAS an unfortunate dis-
ruption in the Church ; end in the census of 1851 it was
found that of 48,1100 attendants on divine service in the
morning, about 8,000 only belonged to the Established
Church—showing that the attendance had greatly fallen
off. The seat rents, in the five years from 1832-7 amounted
'to £5,835 •in the ve years from 1853-8, they yielded only
£3,235. The
surplus derived from that source in the former
period was £3,400, against £1,600 in the latter. He had no
wish to pare down the revenues of the Established Church

in proportion to the number of attendants ; but it should be
remembered that they were dealing with an equitable ad-
justment. In the Old Church, Edinburgh, there were only
47 seats let, and 641 unlet—(hear)—and the
tendance was certainly not 200. Of the 47 seats let, only
one was let to a parishioner. The 011 Church was under
the rule of the High Church, and the High Church was a
collegiate church. The Tolbooth Church had only 14 seats
let, against 634 unlet. He did not propose to abolish the
church. The present incumbent would retain the right to
share in the annuity tax as long as he lived ; but they were
not bound to make provision for future incumbents of those
two churches. The Old Church was vacant at present ; and
ho proposed that the minister to be appointed should not
have the right to share in the annuity tax. He should
therefore give power to the commissioners to be appointed
by this bill to nominate one of the ministers in the collegiate
church to the Old Church. His proposal was to the follow-
ing effect :—An ecclesiastical commission to be appointed
nnder the bill; two or three members to be appointed by
the Presbytery, two by the. Town Council, one by the Fa-
culty of Advocates, and one by the Society of Writers to the
Signet. To those commissioners would bo transferred the
property in the churches, the right to the seat rents, and
all liability for repairs. The seat rents, now amounting to
£1,600 a year, would be collected by them ; it was quite
certain the amount was far below what it ought to be ; in all
probability there would be an increase of about £6O a year.
It is proposed that that fund of £1,600 a year should be accu-
mulated for 15 years at 3/ per cent, interest ; and supposing
the fund to increase at the rate of £6O a year, the 'whole
amount would be £33,600 at the end of that time. Then
there was a sum of £2,000 a year paid frOm the Exchequer,
part of a rent-charge derivable from the docks at Leith. It
had been said that if the annuity tax were abolished, this
charge ought to be remitted ; but he saw no sound reason
for doing that, and proposed that it should be continued. He
would allow it to accumulate in the same way for 15 years,
at 3/ per cent, interest ; and the amount of the two funds at
the end of that period would be about £BO,OOO. He proposed
that the annuity tax should be abolished, but that there
should be laid on by the Towd Council for that 15 years an
assessment of fro n Bd. to 10d. in the pound. The latter was

lower than the present rate. The rate, if levied on the pre-
sent police law assessment along with the police rate, and
paid by all occupiers, would give a surplus produce in the
year of £1,494, after paying the stipends of the ministers
now chargeable on the fund. This annual surplus, accu-
mulated in the way he had described, would yield at the
end of 15 years a sum of £34,000 or £35,000. Then he pro •
posed that the exemption in favour of the lawyers should be
abolished—an exemption which ought never to have existed.
(A laugh.) If the lowest amount of rate were taken-Bd. in
the pound—the capital accumulated at the end of 15 years
would amount to £106,000. If 10d—the highest rate—were
exacted (and that was lower than the existing rate) the
capital would amount to no less than £160,000. That, how-
ever, would be more than sufficient, and what he proposed
to do was, either to take the sum to be collected at £120,000,
or the sum to be furnished by the town at £42,000. The
two things would be very nearly th same, and the result
would be that at the expiration of 15 years there would
be an annual income to the ministers of the interest of
£120,000 at 31 per cent.—£4,2oo. There would be
£2,500 from the seat rents, and £2,000 from the Leith Docks,
giving £8,700 a-year. To give £6OO a-year to 13 ministers,
£7,800 was all that was necessary, and there would still
remain a balance in the hands of the commissioners appli-
cable to expenses. The plan would have this advantage ; it
would put an end to the tax altogether at the end of 15 years,
unless it should be found that the assessment on the town
aor
town,ebgat
rlaieisan e
tednedo.r
robnfHuo
rtredhaechfai doccuchmuot
ma made
eruealratanottoi
oeo
pafnlialno t we
interest
had not yielded £42,000, but he thought this was sure to be
ethan
thepi no
per increase reeeanste. ofhe 1121 ige
y eThisthan p o
tphoes
pa
awn woulda
snt not l
nary,
for ed. in the pound was only £3 6m. per cent., instead of
£3 78., and the whole amount of £60,000, payable on the
other scheme, would be saved. He certainly did not expect
that this measure would satisfy general or abstract views of
this troublesome question, but at all events it afforded a
means of extrication. If the ratepayers considered the rate
too heavy they might reduce it, by spreading it over a greater
number of years, over 20 instead of 15 ; oa the other hand, if
they thought it desirable to terminate the tax sooner, they
could do it by making the rate 10d. instead of Bd. Much
depended on churchmen themselves ; the incomes of the
clergy might be increased and yet diminish the rate mate-
rially. It had been suggested before, and again to him on
that occasion, that the salaries of the ministers might be re-
duced from £6OO to £5OO or £550. If the members of the
Established Church thought that a more desirable plan, and
proposed that reduction in order to maintain the two churches,
he had no objection. But he had not made the proposal, o
lord extend
to eo nn
be-
cause he thought it infinitely better for the Church that 13
their strength over a larger Nu
clergymen should be fully paidriatohoo.ugah,nothl
eeyarnaedd t
billintroduced on
Sir R. FERGUSON said that any
eluded by moving for leave to bring in the bill.
any
objection He therefore did not rise on that occasion to offer
such a subject was deserving of the utmost respect from the
objection to its introduction. He was glad to find that the
learned lord adopted a different principle in framing this
measure from that on which others had framed their bills.
He was glad to find that the learned lord recognised the
duty of the State to support the Established Church of the
country, and the obligation that lay on the city of Edinburgh
to provide for the payment of the ministers of that church.
The tax which was the subject of the present bill had been
levied for two centuries and a half, and he could not under-
stand why the clergymen of the city of Edinburgh should
be dependent on voluntary support, any more than the
clergy in any other part of the country. The learned lord
endeavoured to find a substitute for this tax which had been
50 much complained of, though he confessed he could not
see the justice of those complaints. The measure was en-
titled
to respectful consideration, but he saw one or two
difficulties to its progress. In the first place it seemed hard
especially thatccp city of
no
was s
that the Established Church in Edinburgh should be de-
privescdialalyt p one
when
leinssortehaasninfigvienopof
pitteilamtiionnis. Iters,
t
had been found necessary to build what in Scotland were
the population, and
iturches to meet the spiritual wants of
called
woad
sacra
o
to reduce the number of clergy seemed rather inconsistent, therefore,
tent objection affecting the bill, • There was a more impor-
tant
the imposition of the' inasmuch
as
it
proposed to
deprive the poorer classes of churchseat
arents, and thereby to
Established Church were anxious to
reduceccommration. The I
rents, but
they were unable to do so because they were tehee
of the corporation of Edinburgh. Thebi,.l:Crefloarreer was
open to grave objection on that 6-round. Ho hoped the
friends of the Established Church in this country would
support the friends of the Church of §qotinucl in ratan