112 LOCAL TAXATION 



1893. 



The session of this year opened on 31st January, but did 

 not close until 5th March, 1894. Some part of the record 

 for the latter year will therefore come into this section. 



On 10th April Mr. H. H. Fowler (created in 1908 Viscount 

 Wolverhampton), President of the Local Government Board, 

 presented a report to Parliament on Local Taxation. The 

 Committee deemed the fact of sufficient importance to be 

 dealt with in a special report, and this was widely circulated 

 in the following June. The Committee pointed out that the 

 Fowler Report " was not a simple record of facts and figures, 

 but partook rather of the nature of a laboured argument 

 directed against the rural ratepayer. Every point which 

 could be made against the rural ratepayer was repeatedly 

 pressed, while the urban ratepayer was treated with marked 

 tenderness. It was necessary, therefore, for the Committee 

 to insist specially on the fact that the higher rates in urban, 

 as compared with rural districts, are mainly occasioned by 

 expenditure upon objects all of which may be perfectly 

 legitimate and natural from which the urban ratepayer 

 gains direct benefit, and which the rural ratepayer does not 

 pay for because he does not enjo\^ them." 



Mr. Fowler introduced the Local Government (England and 

 Wales) Bill 011 21st March. The Committee, while recognising 

 that the establishment of District and Parish Councils was the 

 natural consequence of the Local Government Act of 1888. 

 were yet obliged to move a number of amendments to the 

 Bill, and although only partially successful in getting them 

 adopted, they did, to some extent, obtain recognition of their 

 views. Thus the borrowing powers of parishes were limited 

 to half the assessable value of the parish, instead of double 

 the assessable value as first proposed. The limit to the possible 

 rate which a Parish Council could levy was, under the Bill 

 as introduced, quite illusory ; this was made an effective limit, 

 although, in the opinion of the Committee, put at too high 

 a figure. Proposals for restiicting the practice of owners 

 compounding for rates on small tenements, and for fixing 

 the basis of assessment for the new parochial rate at one- 



