respect of the year in which they are payable, notwithstanding that the income or the annual sums, as the case may be, accrued in whole or in part before that year. . . .

PART V

STAMPS

73. Stamp Duty on Conveyances or Transfers on Sales

The stamp duties chargeable under the heading "CONVEYANCE or TRANSFER on Sale of any Property " in the First Schedule to the Stamp Act, 1891 (in this Part of this Act referred to as the principal Act), shall be double those specified in that Schedule: Provided that this section shall not apply to the conveyance or transfer of any stock or marketable security as defined by section one hundred and twenty-two of that Act, or to a conveyance or transfer where the amount or value of the consideration for the sale does not exceed five hundred pounds and the instrument contains a statement certifying that the transaction thereby effected does not form part of a larger transaction or of a series of transactions in respect of which the amount or value, or the aggregate amount or value, of the consideration exceeds five hundred pounds.

74. Stamp Duty on Gifts Inter Vivos

(1) Any conveyance or transfer operating as a voluntary disposition inter vivos shall be chargeable with the like stamp duty as if it were a conveyance or transfer on sale, with the substitution in each case of the value of the property conveyed or transferred for the amount or value of the consideration for the sale:

Provided that this section shall not apply to a conveyance or transfer operating as a voluntary disposition of property to a body of persons incorporated by a special Act, if that body is by its Act precluded from dividing any profit among its members and

the property conveyed is to be held for the purposes of an open space or for the purposes of its preservation for the benefit of the nation.

[Part VI (clauses 80-86) treats of Customs and Excise other than Liquor Licence duties, such as tobacco, motor spirits and special taxes on beer; Part VII (clauses 87-91) provides for payments to local authorities and to the road improvement account; Part VIII (clauses 92-96) is general and supplementary. Six schedules accompany the Act.]

CHAPTER IX

CURBING THE LORDS

[The House of Lords with its overwhelming Conservative majority offered for several years after 1905 a serious check upon the legislative programme of the Liberal Government. In 1906 the Lords rejected important governmental measures dealing with education, licensing, and plural voting, and subsequently displayed no little opposition to various proposals for social reform. The social problem in Great Britain was thus complicated by a political and constitutional question as to the relations between the Houses of Parliament.

This situation the Liberals grasped at once; and as early as June 24, 1907, Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, as Premier, presented a resolution in the House of Commons, "That, in order to give effect to the will of the people as expressed by their elected representatives, it is necessary that the power of the other House to alter or reject Bills passed by this House should be so restricted by law as to secure that within the limits of a single Parliament the final decision of the Commons shall prevail." The debate on this resolution, which brought out the most salient features of the constitutional and political issue, is reproduced, in part, below: Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman's explanation and defence of the proposal (Extract 71); Mr. Arthur J. Balfour's opposition in behalf of the Conservatives (Extract 72); the attack of Mr. D. Shackleton, a Labour Member, upon the undemocratic character of the House of Lords (Extract 73); the scholarly defence of a Second Chamber by Sir William Anson, representing Oxford University and an acknowledged authority on the constitutional

history of England (Extract 74); a clear exposition of the issue both between the Houses and between the Parties, by Mr. Winston Churchill (Extract 75); and Mr. David Lloyd George's scathing arraignment of the Upper House (Extract 76). The resolution was carried by 432 votes to 147.

Lord Rosebery and other prominent members of the Upper House had long advocated some kind of reform in the constitution of their House; and in 1907 they succeeded in securing the appointment of a Select Committee. This Committee, in a lengthy report published on December 3, 1908, proposed to distinguish between Peers and "Lords of Parliament" or Members of the House of Lords; and recommended that, except in case of a Peer of the Blood Royal, a peerage should not entitle one to a seat in that House. The hereditary Peers, including those of Scotland and Ireland, should be entitled to elect 200 representatives to sit in that House for each Parliament, this election being conducted by a form of cumulative voting. The Archbishops should hold seats as of right, the Bishops should elect eight representatives. The Committee would gladly see representatives of the other great Churches in the House, but could formulate no recommendation. Official representatives of the great self-governing Colonies might be introduced into the House without the danger of involving the Colonies in British party politics; as to the representation of India, they could formulate no specific recommendation, but thought its interest would be secured by the presence of ex-Viceroys and other qualified persons in the House. Besides the elective Peers, any Peer should be entitled to sit in the House who had been Cabinet Minister, Viceroy of India, Governor-General of Canada or Australia, High Commissioner for South Africa, or Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, or who had held any of certain Colonial Governorships or high offices or had been Lieutenant-General or Vice-Admiral on the active list, or had sat for a certain period in the Commons. This recommendation would add about 130 Peers to the House. The Crown should be empowered to summon four life Peers

annually, the total not to exceed forty. This would give a House of somewhat less than 400, as against the existing number of considerably over 600. Among many other interesting items the Report stated that proposals had been discussed to admit elected representatives from County Councils and Municipal Corporations, whether Peers or not, but that the Committee, being almost equally divided, made no recommendation.

On the report of the Select Committee on the reform of their own House, the Lords took no action during the year 1909. But as the year advanced, it became increasingly clear to the Liberal Government that they themselves must endeavour to solve the difficulties between the Houses of Parliament by drastic legislative application of the Campbell-Bannerman Resolution of 1907. To have one political party dominant in the House of Commons, and another in the House of Lords, was not only an anomaly, but a serious impediment to constructive legislation. In 1909, it will be remembered, the Upper House weakened the Housing, Town Planning, and Development Acts and rejected altogether the Lloyd George Budget.1 That rejection of the financial measure for the year usurpation, the Liberals called it was the imme

diate occasion for the break between the two Houses.

What would be the outcome? Lord Rosebery, supporting the Select Committee of the House of Lords, had one solution to suggest; Mr. Asquith's Government had another. The majority of the Upper House naturally hoped that the elections of January, 1910, which so closely followed the rejection of the Budget, would restore their Conservative friends to power in the Lower House, in which case any radical parliamentary reform would be quite unnecessary. But their hopes were doomed to disappointment2; and when Mr. Asquith met his new Parliament in 1910 he declared that not only would the passage of the Budget now be insisted upon, but also a definite settlement of the constitutional question along the lines laid down in the Commons Resolution of

1 Cf. supra, chs. vii, viii.

2 Cf. supra, p. 360.

1907.