THE TITHE FIGHT

Evening Post, Volume CXVI, Issue 71, 21 September 1933, Page 22

THE TITHE FIGHT

A BRITISH PROBLEM

FARMERS' ATTACK ON IT

OHTIROH AM) STATE

The countryside is ringing with the word "Tithe,'*- and clashing with differences of opinion on the -subject, writes Doreen Wallace in the London *' Daily Telegraph." Many a townsman has only the vaguest idea what tithe is. He supposes that landowners have to pay a tenth of something ■ for the support of the Church. He is wrong on all counts. Tithe is not now a tenth of anything. It is only nominally paid by the landowner, and actually by the entire farming industry. While two-thirds of the tithe (about £2,000,000) does go to the Church, the remaining third (£1,000,000) is in the hands of laymen. From being, long ago, "the tenth sheaf, "..tithe has developed into a money tax.. Acts of Parliament have made it so. Acts of Parliament may be repealed. It is to open the eyes of our rulers, and of the. public to the necessity of .a change in the law that farmers are making their present stand. Briefly the position has been brought ■ about thus: In, 1836, owing to the diffi-culty-of. collecting tithe in kind, a Commutation Act was passed, converting^ it into a money charge based on the prieo of the three main grain-crops, wheat, barley, and oats. Naturally* the most highly-tithod lands were the arab|lo lands. The man who paid the tithe in those days was the occupier of the land. - • The next step was taken in 1891. Owing to the difficulty of making ten-ant-farmers pay in hard times, the onus of collection; was then put upon the landlord. He found the money, of course, out of rent, so the cultivator of the soil was the real tithe-payer, as before. . ...-.■-. STILL SURVIVES. This system has survived, to the present day, with the difference that in the break-up of. tho large estates after the war a great number of tenantfarmers were faced with the alternative of buying their land or leaving it. Most of them bought it, on bank-credit. And bo- the hitherio small claBS of owneroccupiers became a large class, with liability to pay tithe. Today about 50 per cent, of the tithe comes direct from men who arc actually engaged in farming. ' ' . . During the war corn prices soared until it .'became necessary to control them. Tithe soared, too, until it became necessary to control it. In 1918. an Act was passed limiting the tithe «g all other war profits were limited. , ..The -Act of 1925 is the real source of trouble. -It' was conceived in a time of comparative prosperity, following a b00m..-No one could have been expected to foresee the depths to which Jagricultarerwas'to fall;-but it1 might have been;foreseen; that;after a boom there was bouttd to be a certain depression. ,_. .; ■■••-..' ."'; -■" ■-■■■■••'••■;<■■:v The year 1625 was not propitious for the stabilisation ■• of any charge, let clone a charge. on. farmers, who have always been at:the"inercy of the world's exports; Nevertheless, in 1925 Parliament enacted that the tithe, valued in 1836 at £100, should henceforward be £105, with an additional. £4 10s to go towards a sinking fund for the total extermination 'of the tithe over a period of eighty-five years. In the case of lay tithe there was no sinking fund, but the tithe was established at £105 in perpetuity. It is strange that statesmen should lave thought fit to stabilise a tax in times of flux. Income-tax is not stabilised, nor are import duties,, nor rates. But if such a thing was attempted farmers gay there ought to have been a revaluation of the tithe. "Values of 1836 did not apply to 1925: they apply Still less to 1033.: . ' • CANNO3* CONTINUE. _ In 1836 the Corn. Laws were in operation, wheat was ;2Ss a sajsk, and wage? 7s a week; today wages are 30s in most counties, and wheat is down, to 12S. . ' ■..:'• •■ , -v:": ■ ■'• •.-■■•■ ■ ■ The 1925 Act is represented as being an agreed .. measure. . The Farmers' Union sever agreed to it;;but what were- they-among so many?. That is the farmers? case. •-They' know that tha tithe-owners have tho law on their side. They ask for a revision of the law. . Other laws ■ are repealed—for instance, the Corn Production Act. Why not this one t - AIL who know the land feel that the collection of the tithe cannot continue as at present. '„ For some five years fanners have paid the tithe out of capital^ Now they are' refusing to pay, their stock (it is their capital) is being distrained upon. The tithe-owner assumes that the farmer buys hia land more cheaply because the tithe is on' it—that, as it were, part of the purchase money has been, lent him. Thefarmef says that on that hypothetical loan he is paying very heavy interest. Tithe in. East Anglia ie about 7s an acre} at 5 per cent, that would be interest on £7. Did the tithe-owner. lend thp farmer &7 an acre-oi his purchase money? How comes it, then, "that; a tithe-free farm was recently sold in Suffolk for prily £8 an acre? . : . Queen Anne's Bounty, which collects the ecclesiastical tithe, is willing to investigate the affairs of individual farmers and offer them • temporary rebates during the-/had times.- Since Queen Anne's Bounty acts as trustee for the parsons, that is the most it can do._ But the farmers want a more rational settlement, to- be brought about under a- new law. SCHEME CONCEIVED. Hence the formation of numerous tithe-payers^ associations up and down the country. . The parent association has framed, a scheme protecting the life-interests of. present- incumbents, and providing for. the redemption of tithe on the basis of its selling price in the open market (for it is regularly bought and-,sold by lay owners, at a much smaller figure than that which the ecclesiastical owners set. upon it). This scheme they hop© to put before Parliament as soon as Parliament will lead an ear. ■ Various elements in the House of Commons are converging towards an inquiry. But these things take time. Meanwhile the farmers resort to passive resistance. In nine cases out of ten tho refusal to pay tithe arises from real inability to pay, coupled with unwillingness to treat with Queen Anne's Bounty for charity. While the farmers wait for "something to be done," the collection of tithe goes on, by means of distraint upon their cattle, implements, and even furniture. ". It must be admitted that in the early stages of resistance.. the, farmers checkmated. the tithe-owners by refus ing to bid'at distraint auctions; and under the subsequent system of sales by tender Jit .has sometimes been made difficult for.:the~tenderer.to get away with the goods. It is possible for a tithe-payer to obtain by' law-'a' remission, of any tithe in oxcess of two-thirds of the annual value of his land. These are not generous terms. '• The titherOwner, with no responsibility towards the land, gets two-thirds of the annual value (i.e., Tent), while out of the remaining third the owner "of the land.'has to live and to undertake the -landowner 's customary obligations, of repairs, : insurances, and so on. ' ' I