784 TRANSACTIONS OP SECTION P. 



The following Papers were read :— 



1. The needed Reforux in the Assessment of Raihoays fur Local Taxation. 



By F. Oliver Lyons, M.A. 



Protection against over-assessment is enjoyed by all ratepayers except railway 

 companies. The railway companies can, in common fairness, claim the same 

 protection against over-assessment. The ' cumulo ' principle of assessment ia 

 invulnerable. Details are separable from the principle ; no disparagement of the 

 details aifects the principle. What has actually happened under the ' parochial ' 

 system of assessment is that the English and Welsh railways were over-assessed 

 in 1906 by at least 3,000,000/. sterling. Under the ' cumulo ' method of assess- 

 ment the railways would have been saved in rates, say, 700,000^. per annum. 

 The net annual value of each railway as a whole would have been the maximum 

 limit of rateable value, and hence the necessary guarantee against over-assessment 

 would have existed. Large sums which were spent by the companies on rating 

 appeals would have been saved; unless total net annual value warranted an 

 increase in the total rateable value, any increase in the latter, made on account of 

 improvements at stations, would have had to be taken oif elsewhere. The vital 

 defect in the ' parochial ' system overshadows all its other defects, since the total 

 amount of their assessment is really all that seriously concerns a railway 

 company. It was recommended by the Royal Commission on Local Taxation 

 that a central authority should be appointed who would value each railway 

 by the ' cumulo ' method. The rateable value of the railways, as ascertained by 

 the 'parochial' system, is nothing better than guesswork, and there is much 

 uncertainty about the ' parochial ' system. The responsibility for the existing 

 state of aifairs rests with the companies' rating surveyors, whose evidence before 

 the Royal Commission on Local Taxation was hostile to the * cumulo ' principle, 

 and their hostility was founded on the imperfection of a detail which was of no 

 importance to the companies. The explanation of the attitude taken up by the 

 companies' rating surveyors. The essential data for assessment purposes are 

 not compiled by the railway companies. No responsible surveyor would contend 

 that the railways are not over- assessed, because definite and final proof that they are 

 is not obtainable from the railway returns. The chairmen of the companies have 

 never had the only information which would enable them to show the share- 

 holders the true assessment position. The author concluded by discussing the 

 attitude of outside interests towards the ' cumulo ' method of assessment, the 

 remedy open to the railway companies, and the problem to be solved. 



2. Nationalisation of Irish Raihoays. i/y J. O'CoNNoR. 



Compulsory purchase of the Irish railways by the State would only be justified 

 if it is clear that a substantial benefit would thereby be secured to the country 

 and on the terms of full compensation being made to the shareholders and stock- 

 holders. 



If the benefit is small and uncertain, or if the shareholders were not 

 adequately compensated, the operation would be indefensible. 



Anything less than a reduction of, say 2-5 per cent, in rates and fares (taken 

 as an average), would be merely trifling with the subject ; even that percentage 

 would produce little or no effect on the general prosperity of the country, and 

 give little aid in competition with other countries— because the distances covered 

 by the Irish railways are comparatively short, and the gross freights little ; because 

 the staple products of the country are valuable in comparison Avith the rate ; 

 because, as regards the general body of the traffic, the rates are paid by manufac- 

 turers and they fall to a large extent on imported goods ; and because only the 

 local proportion of cross-channel rates could be affected. 



Taking 25 per cent., for the purpose of illustration, as representing the average 

 reduction of rates and fares, which might be mgre in one class of traffic and less 



