Here, then, are two small and secondary problems.  Under Home Rule Ireland will have no claim to further Imperial credit for loans of either of the above classes.  On the other hand, there is no reason why the Treasury, if it pleases, and on its own terms, should not lend as before, though not directly, as it virtually does now, but indirectly, by loan to the Irish Government.  The security will be just as good, and probably better.  If a negligent Local Government Board under Irish control sanctions reckless loans by local authorities, and a negligent Irish Government advances for such loans money borrowed from Great Britain, the Irish Treasury will suffer.  Such eventualities need not seriously be considered.  The analogy with the Transvaal and Canada loans, which were mainly for public works, is very close.

FOOTNOTES: 

[152] Parts of this chapter have appeared in a paper by the Author in “Home Rule Problems.”

[153] Agricultural Statistics of Ireland, 1909.

[154] See pp. 10-17, 66-71.

[155] See p. 270-271.

[156] See p. 267.

[157] Cd. 4005, 1908.

[158] This and subsequent figures are taken from an answer to question in the House of Commons, July 25, 1911, and from the current Exports of the Land Commission and Estates Commissioners.

[159] Cd. 4412, 1908.  The basis taken was the Poor Law valuation of the lands unsold, multiplied by the number of years purchase of the lands sold under the Act of 1903.  On this basis the value of the land neither sold nor agreed to be sold in 1908 was L103,931,848.  On the basis of acreage, the estimate worked out at L102,078,448, and on the basis of holdings (regarded as unreliable by the Commissioners) at L92,660,694.  The total sum required from first to last, including sums already advanced under all the various Acts, was L208,366,175.

[160] Pasture land let on eleven months’ tenancies (a common form of tenure) counts as untenanted land, and is subject to purchase by the Land Commissioners, compulsorily, if necessary.

[161] But not always.  Heavily mortgaged landlords profited most, perhaps, under the Act of 1903.

[162] Only once exercised up to October, 1911:  over Lord Inchiquin’s estate in Clare, to be acquired for the relief of congestion.

[163] See p. 75.  There the loan for compulsory Land Purchase was ultimately raised by the Dominion of Canada, as one of the conditions upon which Prince Edward Island entered the Federation in 1873.  Under the Land Purchase Act, passed in 1875 by the Island Legislature, with the assent of the Dominion, three Commissioners adjudicated upon the sales; representing the Island Government, the Landlords, and the Dominion Government respectively.

[164] Finance accounts of the United Kingdom, 1911.

[165] Report of the Commissioners of Public Works, 1910.  The amount in 1907-08 was L434,796; in 1908-09, L361,282.  The Commissioners have been lending since 1819, and have lent since that date L48,792,319.