Rates on Agricultural Land (Relief) Act, 1935

Methods of making allowances.

13.—(1) Save as is otherwise provided by this section, the allowance or allowances required by this Act to be made by the council of a county or of a scheduled urban district to any person shall be made by means of an abatement (equal to the amount of such allowance or the total of such allowances, as the case may be) of the rates which would, but for such abatement, be payable by such person to such council for the service of the current financial year.

(2) Every abatement made by the council of a county or of a scheduled urban district to any person in pursuance of this section shall be made in accordance with the following rules, that is to say:—

(a) where such person is rated by such council in respect of only one tenement of agricultural land, the abatement shall be made on the rates payable by such person in respect of such tenement;

(b) where such person is rated by such council in respect of two or more tenements of agricultural land, the abatement shall be made, at the option of such council, either—

(i) on the rates payable by such person in respect of such one of the said tenements as such council shall direct, or

(ii) in such proportions as such council shall direct on the respective rates payable by such person in respect of the said several tenements;

(c) in every case (save where the abatement is made by the issue of a credit note), the abatement made on any rates shall be shown on the demand note for those rates.

(3) The council of a county may, with the sanction of the Minister, decide to make the whole or a particular proportion of the allowances required by this Act to be made by such council by issuing to every person entitled under this Act to any such allowance a credit note declaring him entitled to credit for a sum equal (as the case may require) to the whole or to the said proportion of the allowances to which he is so entitled as against the rates payable by him to such council for the service of the current financial year.

(4) Where—

(a) a person is rated in respect of a tenement of agricultural land situate in the rating area of the council of a county, and

(b) such tenement and a tenement of agricultural land situate in the rating area of the council of a scheduled urban district are deemed to form a single tenement for the purposes of this Act, and

(c) the aggregate amount of the allowances required by this Act to be made to such person by the council of such county exceeds the amount of the rates payable by such person to such council for the service of the current financial year,

the council of such county shall make so much of such allowances as is equal to the said excess of such allowances over the said rates by means of the issue to such person of a credit note declaring him to be entitled to credit for the amount of such excess as against the rates payable by him to the council of the said scheduled urban district for the service of the current financial year, and the council of such county shall pay to the council of such scheduled urban district the amount of every such credit note which is duly delivered to the council of such scheduled urban district by the person to whom it was issued by the council of such county.

(5) Where the council of a county is entitled under or required by this Act to make the whole or any particular proportion of an allowance by means of a credit note, such council may, if they so think proper, issue such credit note in two separate parts each of which declares the person to whom it is issued to be entitled to credit for one moiety of the total sum for which such credit note is issued.

(6) The issue by a council of a credit note may be effected in either of the following ways, that is to say:—

(a) by delivering such credit note to the person entitled to the allowance made (whether wholly or partly) by the issue thereof or to his lawfully authorised agent, or

(b) by sending such credit note by post in an envelope addressed to such person at the address in the books of such council for the service of demands for rates made on such person in respect of the tenement to which such credit note relates.