The chief causes of the depression were said to be these:--
1. The succession of unfavourable seasons, causing crops deficient in quantity and quality, and losses of live stock.
2. Low prices, partly due to foreign imports and partly to the inferior quality of the home production.
4. Increased pressure of local taxation by the imposition of new rates, viz. the education rate and the sanitary rate; and the increase of old rates, especially the highway rate, in consequence of the abolition of turnpikes. Some exceptionally bad instances of this were given. In the parish of Didmarton, Gloucestershire, the average amount of rates paid for the five years ending March 31, 1858, was £26 6s. 3d., for the five years ending March 31, 1878, £118 11s. 7d. In the Northleach Union the rates had increased thus in decennial periods from 1850:--
1850-1 £5,471 1860-1 5,534 1870-1 8,525 1878-9 10,089
On one small property in Staffordshire the increase of rates, other than poor rates, amounted to 3s. 6d. in the £ on the rateable value.
5. Excessive rates charged by railway companies for the conveyance of produce, and preferential rates given to foreign agricultural produce; the railway companies alleging, in defence of this, that foreign produce was consigned in much greater bulk, by few consignors, than home grown, and could be conveyed much more economically than if picked up at different stations in small quantities.
As to the effect of restrictive covenants on the depression, the balance of evidence did not incline either way.[669]
The Agricultural Holdings Act of 1875 was stated to have done much good in the matter of compensation to tenants for improvements, notwithstanding its merely permissive character, as it had reversed the presumption of law in relation to improvements effected by the tenant, prescribed the amount of compensation, and the mode in which it should be given.
As to the important subject of freedom of cropping and sale of produce, there were diverse opinions, some advocating it wholly, others not believing in it at all, others saying each landlord and each tenant should make their own bargains since each farm stands on its own footing, others again favouring modified restrictions. The preponderance of opinion was in favour of a modification of the law of distress.