By what authorities raised.—The principal authorities responsible for the imposition of local rates are the poor law authorities, sanitary authorities, [school boards,] county councils, rural district councils, and town councils. The indi vidual responsibility of these bodies for the grand total sum mentioned below for the year 1905-6 was approximately as follows : 24 millions was raised and received by the sanitary authorities. The poor law authorities follow with 13 millions; the county and municipal authorities,111- millions ; and the elementary education authorities, 91 millions. The total is one that consistently increases year by year. In 1890-91 it was nearly £28,000,000, or about £12,000,000 less than in 1898-99. To this increase the London and urban sanitary authorities contributed about £4,500,000, at the rate of from £500,000 to X600,000 per annum, a result which can be attributed, to a considerable extent, to the continual creation and growth of urban districts by means of the inclusion of areas hitherto within the jurisdiction of rural district councils. Rural districts, on the other hand, are only rarely extended by the inclusion of urban areas. In 1905-6 the figure had risen to .£58,255,544, an increase of 39 millions compared with 1874-5.
Valuation and population.—It is interesting to note the relation between this increase of rates and the increase of population. Do the rates increase only to the same extent as the population increases ; or do they decrease from that point of view, or increase more rapidly ? The answer is the not very satisfactory one that they increase more rapidly ; and that within recent years and at present there has been, and continues, an acceleration in the rapidity. Taking the years 1874-99, and dividing them into equal periods of five years each, it would appear that from the first of these quinquennial periods to the last the increase per cent. in the amount of rates raised has been 15.3, 14.4, 10, and 239 ; but the increase per cent. in the estimated population has only been 6.9, 6.4, 5.7, 5.8, and 5.9. If rateable value is also brought into comparison, the official statistics show that during the same quinquenniums its increase per cent. has been 16.6, 9'3, 6•5, and 7'9, and that consequently the rates have now outstripped the rateable value. Statistics are now available as regards rateable value up to the year 1900, and taking these it will be seen that in 1871 the valuation was at the rate of £4, 16s. 1d. per head of the population ; in 1898, £5, 9s. 2d. ; in 1899, £5, 10s. 2d. ; and in 1900, £5, lls. 1Id. But omitting these two last years it may be stated that in 1868 the rates then raised were equivalent to an average of 3s. 4d. in the X ; in 1890-91 they had increased to 3s. 8d. in the X ; in 1898-99, to 4s. 10d. ; and in 1905-6, to 6s. i d. And so they continue to increase, not withstanding the relief which has been afforded to the ratepayer from imperial funds since 1888 has been greater in proportion to the total rates than at any previous period. In 1898-99 that relief was equivalent to rates of 9jd. in the
£ on the rateable values of that year. In 1905-6 it had risen to Is. 1 lid., of which ls. 21d. was for education.
Expenditure upon the more important local services.—Such services may be classed under five heads, viz. : (a) Poor relief (including lunatics and lunatic asylums) ; (1) elementary education ; (e) police ; (d) roads, streets, and bridges (including lighting and scavenging) ; and (e) sewerage. And the following table summarises the rates connected therewith ; though its figures are subject, in some cases, to modification in respect of rates which may have been applied to purposes other than those attributed to them, and to exchequer contributions which may have been applied in aid of rates. For general considerations, how ever, the figures in the table are sufficiently near the exact facts.
In connection with this table it should be remarked that the expendi ture upon poor relief and the maintenance of lunatics is increasing far more rapidly than the population. Between 1890-91 and 1899-1900 the expenditure per inhabitant in England and Wales increased from es. to 7s. .3)2d., i.e. by upwards of 21 per cent. In 1900-7 this had increased to 7s. 9d. per inhabitant. And in London the average expenditure per inhabitant, the cost of relief per pauper, and the average rate in the X required are much greater than the averages for the extra-metropolitan unions, —facts which may be accounted for in several ways. For one thing, in London the cost of the maintenance of patients in the fever and small-pox hospitals of the Metropolitan Asylums Board falls upon the poor law authorities, whereas the provision of hospitals for infectious diseases in the rest of the country is, for the most part, a charge upon the rates raised by the sanitary authorities. And to this may be added the fact that the county sanitary authorities can recover, where possible, from non-pauper patients the expense of their maintenance ; but the metropolitan poor law authorities have no power to do this. Another reason for the excess of expenditure in the metropolis is found in the fact that there the paupers relieved in the workhouses and infirmaries bear a much larger proportion to the total number of paupers of all classes relieved than they do in other parts of the country. And yet another reason is the contributions which the metropolitan poor law authorities make to the asylums authorities ; and another, the more expensive pauper accommodation supplied in London. 'File average amount of relief given in the metropolis to each outdoor pauper during the years 1890-91 and 1899-1900 has been X5, 17s. 21d. ; for the rest of England and Wales the figure is X5, 5s. 110. For 1906-7 the average annual cost of an outdoor pauper has been estimated at X7, ls., the like cost of an indoor pauper being about X29, 5s.