944 THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN. May 10, 1918. (3), 0-40 mm. (30), 28-50 fr.; grains, over 15 mm. (20), 47 fr.; through and through (1) (15), 45*50 fr.; (2) (22), 37 fr.; (3) (32), 29 fr. Screenings and Washery Products.—Picked waste (3), over 40 mm., 14*50 fr.; (4) over 40 mm., 9 fr.; crushed screenings (4), 12*50 fr.; washery waste (40) 28 fr. ; schist, 21*50 fr.; washery sludge, 14*50. Mines de Villebceuf. Large (10), 67*50 fr. ,* cobbles, over 45 mm. (12), 62*50 fr.; smithy small, 8-18 mm. (10), 62*50 fr. ; grains, over 18 mm. (15), 53 fr.; fine slack, 0-8 mm. (15), 50 fr. Briquettes.— (12) 66*50 fr.; ovoids (18), 63*50 fr. Cie. des Mines de Roche-la-Moliere et Firminy. Malafolie Pit.—Large (12), 56*50 fr.; nuts (1), over 30 mm. (14), 51*50 fr.; (2) (20), 47 fr.; washed nuts, 25-45 mm. (14), 49 fr.; washed beans, 8-25 mm. (14), 46 fr.; washed small, 0-8 mm. (14), 38 fr.; small (1), under 15 mm. (14), 40 fr.; (2) (20), 31*50 fr.; screened slack (1), over 15 mm. (15), 47 fr. • through and through (1) (15), 42.50 fr.; (2) (20), 35 fr.; (3) (30), 26 fr. Roche-la-Moliere Pit.—Large (12), 55*50 fr.; nuts, over 30 mm., (14), 50 fr.; (20), 47 fr.; washed nuts, 30-50 mm., (14), 51 fr.; washed smithy small, ‘8-30 mm. (10), 51 fr.; washed slack, 0-8 mm. (14), 38 fr.; fine slack, under 10 mm. (13), 36 fr.; screened slack, over 10 mm. (12), 45*50 fr.; through and through smithy (1) (10), 50 fr.; through and through (13), 41*50 fr.; (18), 36*50 fr. La Varenne Pit.—Large (14), 56*50 fr.; nuts (1), over 30 mm. (12), 53*50 fr.; (2) (20),' 47 fr.; slack (1), under 15 mm. (14), 40*50 fr.; screened slack, over 15 mm. (14), 48*50 fr.; through and through (1) (14), 42*50 fr. ■ (2) (20), 34 fr.; (3) (30), 26 fr. La Chaux Pit.—Through and through small (16), 38*50 fr. Screenings and Washery Products.—Picking waste, over 45 mm. (40), 19*50 fr.; washery waste (40), 15 fr.; washery sludge, Roche pit (25), 16 fr.; Malafolie pit, 13 fr. Briquettes.—(13), 59 fr. Cie. des Mines de la Peronniere. Coal, 10-11 per cent, volatiles.—Cubes, over 110 mm. (10), 60 fr.; cobbles, 80-110 mm. (10) 62*50 fr.; large nuts, 55-85 mm. (10) 66 fr.; nuts, 40-45 mm. (10), 68 fr.; washed nuts 30-40 mm. (10), 64*50 fr.; washed small (1), 20-30 mm. (15), 49*50 fr.; small (3), 8-16 mm. (18), 42*50 fr.; fine slack, 0-8 mm. (20), 40 fr. Briquettes.—Ovoids (18), 62*50 fr. . Soc. des Mines de la Haute-Cappe. Coal, 20 per cent, volatiles.—Cobbles, over 40 mm. (12), 67 fr.; washed nuts, 30-50 mm. (12) 63 fr.; smithy small, 12-30 mm. (10), 62 fr.; fine slack, 8-12 mm. (16), 47*50 fr.; through and through (1) (14), 58 fr.,; (2), with 40 per cent, over 30 mm. (16), 54*50 fr.; (2), with 25 per cent, over 30 mm. (18), 51 fr.; unscreened small, 0-35 mm. (18), 46*50 fr. IMAGINARY INCOME TAX ON IMAGINARY ROYALTIES. [From a Legal Correspondent.] To most of us the burden of income tax is such a grim reality that it is almost a relief to have it suggested that under any circumstances it can be a product of the imaginative faculty. Income tax officials are usually models of painstaking, but certainly prosaic, accuracy, and it requires a stretch— or, rather, a wrench—of imagination on our part to picture a hard-working surveyor romancing in the realms of poetic fancy, that is to say, within official hours, and “arising out of, and in the course of” his official duties. But as the law at present stands, there is such a reality as imaginary income tax, and, fittingly enough, it is attached to an equally non- actual income. These peculiarities face us in regard to the ascertainment of excess mineral rights duty under the decision recently given by Mr. Thomas J ones, referee in a case between the Duke of Northum- berland and the Inland Revenue. The way the matter stands is thus : — A. There is the Mineral Rights Duty imposed by the present Prime Minister’s famous Budget of 1909-10. Unlike the other land taxes thereby set up (of which it is one nominally, but hardly in reality) it has yielded substantial revenue. It is Is. per £1 on the mineral rental value. When the minerals are let, the rental value is “ the amount of rent paid in the last working year.” Under this it has been held that the word “paid” is to be taken so literally that, when the royalties come to, say, £1,000, and the mineral tenant pays to the royalty owner a net sum of £700 (being the £1,000, less income tax at 6s.) “ the amount of rent paid” is £700, and not £1,000, so the Mineral Rights Duty is not £50, but only £35. This was decided by the Court of Appeal in Duke of Beaufort v. Inland Revenue ([1913] 3 K.B. 48). It is this judgment which lies at the bottom of all the trouble. Since then in other connections it has been held that, when any ordinary tenant pays his landlord’s Schedule A tax, that is actually a part payment of the rent. It may also be worth while to point out that the 1842 Income Tax Act, section 60, recognises this very expressly, the words being that the landlord shall allow the deduction “ on receipt of the residue of the rent,” and, as though that might not be enough, there is a substantive enactment that “ a tenant who pays the tax shall be acquitted and discharged of so much money as is represented by the deduction, as if that sum had actually been paid as rent.” But beyond noting these things it is outside our purpose to argue against the Beaufort judgment. B. Then in 1915 there was imposed the Excess Mineral Rights Duty, which is a war tax. It is pay- able only when the royalties fluctuate with the price of the minerals. It is “ an addition to any mineral rights duty payable or paid.” It is 80 per cent, of the excess profit ascertained as directed in the Act (F.A. 1915 No. 2). In dealing with the accounting year the reference is to the “ amount of rent so payable.” The pre-war rent standard is ascertained by the taxpayer’s choice of two of the three pre-war years, but “the pre-war rent value shall, as respects each of the three years immediately preceding the first accounting year, be taken to be the sum to which the rent for the accounting year would amount if the rent, so far as variable according to price, were based on the average prices governing the payment of the rent in that year.” A hard nut to crack. From the supreme bench in Scotland it has been described as meaningless if con- strued grammatically. ( But it is held to mean that you find the fictitious ad hoc pre-war rentals by taking the mineral output of the accounting year and apply- ing to that the average prices of the pre-war year. Upon this three things may be said. The results so ascertained are purely fictitious. The same pre-war year will be deemed to have had different rentals on the ascertainment of each year’s Excess Mineral Rights Duty. There might be a “statutory” excess rental when in fact there was a fall. It is to be noted b ■—1£ Fig. i.—Section. Fig. 2.—Front Elevation. Door on the left open, that on the right closed. that, though the Beaufort decision was two years before this enactment of the Excess Mineral Rights Duty, the Act contains no reference to income tax. There is, however, the word “ payable ” as against the 1909-10 word “paid.” C. The grievance which we have mentioned of a notional excess, when, in fact, there was identity, or a fall, was raised in Parliament, and when, in 1917, the rate was increased to 80 per cent, of the “ excess,” it was provided that, if the rent “payable” for the accounting year is not greater than the average rent “payable” for the selected pre-war years, there shall be no Excess Mineral Rights Duty. J & Fig. 3.—Door Discharging on to Portable Screen. These are the data or factors, and the questions are : — 1. In comparing the accounting year’s and pre- war years’ rentals, is income tax to be brought into computation at all? 2. If it is, then at what rates ? It may be taken as conceded that in this event the tax for the accounting year must be its own actual tax, but it has been thought that there is room for differ- ence of opinion in regard to the pre-war years —shall it be the tax of each pre-war selected year, or the tax of the accounting year? The question is of importance owing to the .great increase in the tax. Suppose the gross figures are:—Accounting year, £1,200; pre-war average, £1,000. If income tax is to be ignored there is-an excess of £200, and (there being no free £200) there would be a claim for £160 of duty. If, on the other hand, you are to deduct the present rate of tax in both cases, the figures would be £840, as against £700; excess, £140, duty, £112. But, finally, if you deduct tax at the respective rates, you have £1,200 less 6s., which is £840, as against £1,000 less Is. 2d., which is £942, and so there is no excess, and therefore no liability for duty. In the recent case it was contended for the Inland Revenue that tax should be excluded altogether, but as they had assessed on the contrary view, they did not press that argument in that case. Alternatively, they urged that both figures should be subjected to the tax rate of the accounting year. The Duke of Northumberland argued, of course, that tax must be brought in, and that it must be the tax at the respective actual rates of the different years. The referee has decided in favour of the Duke. In the writer’s judgment, the Department’s con- tention for the tax of the accounting yea’r only is unarguable. But there may be much more to be said for their other position, that tax is to be ignored entirely, and no doubt that will come up again. We venture to think that even the Beaufort judgment might stand reconsideration in the House of Lords. LOADING DOOR FOR COKE RAMPS.* By H. Hermanns. The employment of sloping ramps in coking plant has greatly simplified the operation of loading the coke into wagons, the coke descending the slope easily, and the arrangement has the additional advan- tage that a large stock of coke can be accumulated on the ramp when the work of removing it is temporarily stopped from any cause, loading being resumed as soon as the stoppage is at an end. More- over, should there be a protracted shortage of railway wagons, the loading devices can be soon changed over for delivering the coke to a stockyard instead of to the screening plant, and, finally, the sloping ramp lessens the exposure of the workmen to moisture in quenching the coke. The doors through which the coke is loaded from the ramp into wagons are either of the revolving or vertical-lift type, and are subjected to considerable strain from the pressure of the superincumbent mass of coke, which greatly retards the operation of closing them. Recently a new type of door for this purpose has been introduced by Heckel, of Saarbriicken, which obviates this difficulty, the operation of closing being effected with a minimum application of force. Figs. 1 and 2 show, in section and front elevation respectively, this new door, which consists of two vertical slides which move in opposite directions. The lower slide, which is bent at an angle and forms, when open, a continuation of the sloping ramp, forces its way into the descending coke when raised and stops its progress almost instantaneously, because the wffiole mass has to overcome such an amount of friction and cohesive force that a very small resistance suffices to bring it to a standstill. The upper slide * Gliickauf.