LAND VALUES DUTIES PASSED.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLIII, Issue 116, 14 May 1909, Page 5

LAND VALUES DUTIES PASSED.

"IS OWNING FREEHOLD A CRIME?"

(Received May 14, 8.15 a.m.) LONDON, May 13. The land values duties were carried by 330 votes to 120. Mr Harold Cox maintained that there was no legitimate difference between income derived from land and income derived from other sources. He asked why mortgages on land were not treated like land itself. Was mortgage enterprise, but owning freehold a crime? He derided taxing ungotten minerals like taxing bachelors for the potential value of unforgotten offspring. I Mr Lyttelton showed the immense cost of valuation. The money sweated off owners would not go to the Exchequer, but to lawyers and surveyors. Messrs Austen Chamberlain and Balfour hotly protested against the haste of the Government in forcing the proposals through.