Aberdeen District Lunacy Board v Assessor for Aberdeenshire
| Jurisdiction | Scotland |
| Judgment Date | 19 March 1907 |
| Date | 19 March 1907 |
| Docket Number | No. 113. |
| Court | Court of Session |
Lord Low, Lord Dundas.
Valuation ActsAppealForm of CaseStatement of FactsAmendmentMinute of admission of facts on appealValuation of Lands (Scotland) Amendment Act, 1879 (42 and 43 Vict. cap. 42), secs. 7 and 9.
A case for appeal under the Valuation of Lands (Scotland) Amendment Act, 1879, in a case in which there had not been any evidence led, did not contain any statement by the Valuation Committee of facts admitted, or within the personal knowledge of the Committee. The appellants, who had objected to the form in which the case was ultimately
stated, moved the Court to remit the case for amendment. The Court remitted to the Valuation Committee to restate the case, setting forth the facts bearing on the matter at issue which they found to be admitted or within their personal knowledge.
Thereafter the parties lodged a joint minute of admissions, and were heard on the merits.
ValuationPrinciple of ValuationAsylumAsylum built on segregate or villa systemPauper Lunatic AsylumRate per bedPercentage on Cost.
A pauper lunatic asylum was constructed on a new system called the segregate system, i.e., the asylum consisted of a number of separate villas or residences. The total expenditure on it was 119,200. It accommodated 479 patients, but the administrative block, laundry, machinery, &c., were erected to meet an extension of the dormitory buildings to accommodate 700 patients. The Assessor entered the asylum in the Valuation-roll for the year ending Whitsunday 1907 at the yearly rent or value of 3250, which was the valuation at which it had been entered since 1904, when it was opened. The Lunacy Board appealed, and maintained that the valuation should, on a comparison with that of other asylums, be fixed at 1916, being at the rate of 4 per bed. The Valuation Committee sustained the Assessor's valuation.
Held that the Committee were wrong, and that the valuation should be 2400, which was approximately 5 per bed, or 2 per cent on the cost of construction, 5 per bed being a fair rate, keeping in view that, owing to the system of construction adopted, a rent higher than in the case of an asylum constructed on an older system might reasonably be expected.
At a meeting of the Valuation Committee for the county of Aberdeen other than the Deer District of the county, held on 14th September 1906, for the purpose of hearing and determining appeals under the Valuation of Lands (Scotland) Acts, for the year to Whitsunday 1907, the District Lunacy Board of Aberdeen City appealed against the following entry in the Valuation-roll, viz.:
| Description and Situation of Subjects. | Proprietor. | Tenant. | Occupier. | Yearly Rent or Value of Subject. | |
| Asylum, Kingseat. | District Lunacy Board for the Aberdeen City Lunacy District, p. C. B. Williams, Clerk, 20 Union Terrace, Aberdeen. | Proprietors. | 3250 | 0 | 0 |
The appellants craved that the yearly rent or value should be entered at 1916.
The Valuation Committee sustained the Assessor's valuation, and, at the request of the District Lunacy Board, stated a case for appeal. [Case 247]
The case set forth:
The appellants contended that, although the asylum had been constructed upon a new system known as the villa system, its valuation should be fixed upon the basis of so much per occupied bed, that the number of beds was 479, and that, as the Court had decided in the WoodileeSC,1 case that 4 per bed was a reasonable sum, the valuation upon this basis be fixed at 1916.
A comparative statement shewing the number of patients, valuations, &c., of various asylums in Scotland was submitted by the appellants, and is printed as Statement No. 1 of the Appendix to the case.*
No witnesses were examined on behalf of the parties, but the facts of the case and the contentions of the parties are fully brought out in the following statements by the appellants and the Assessor, viz.:
The Appellants' Statement and Grounds of Appeal, as set forth in the case, were as follows:
The appellants submit that public lunatic asylums are a class of subjects by themselves, and are therefore comparable in the matter of valuation with others of that class, and with them alone; that no other class of property forms any criterion, either as regards cost of erection or accommodation, by which to estimate the probable rent that such a subject would fetch year by year in the market; and that ruling consideration is not affected by the fact that the Kingseat Asylum is built on the segregate principle, for it is designed externally and internally, and in all its separate parts, with the one end in view, of the reception and treatment of lunatic patients.
In the case of the Barony Parochial BoardSC, decided 2d April 1877, 4 R. p. 1149, the Valuation Appeal Court held that 4 per bed
was a proper allowance for the valuation of such an institution as the Woodilee Lunatic Asylum there in question, and, as the valuation of 2500 proposed there by the Kirkintilloch Parochial Board was stated to be not quite 2 per cent of the cost of erection, it follows that the valuation of 1600 fixed by the Appeal Court would be not quite l2 per cent of that cost. Again in the case of the Melrose Burgh Commissioners v. Roxburgh, Berwick, and Selkirk District Lunacy BoardSC, 18th February 1898, 25 R., p. 586, the sum of 4 per bed was accepted expressly on the authority of the Barony Parochial Board case, as a proper allowance for the valuation of a public lunatic asylum, and the table of rating produced in that case discloses the fact that the highest percentage that the valuation bears to the cost of erection is 247, while in other cases it falls as low as 101 and 11 per cent. (The table is printed as No. 2 of the Appendix.)*
In the table of returns [Appendix No. 1] submitted to the Valuation Committee, it will be seen that out of the fifteen asylums in Scotland, other than the Kingseat Asylum there mentioned, the proportion of 4 per bed is only exceeded in the valuation of the Crichton, Dundee, Hawkhead, and Melrose Asylums, these standing, in the order above stated, at 7, 12s. l1d., 6, 18s. 10d., 6, 6s. 2d., and 5, 7s. l1d. respectively. But, in the case of each of these institutions, it has to be observed that, in the first place, it is situated in a very much more valuable locality, from the point of view of a possible tenant, than is the Kingseat Asylum. They are all built in, or in the immediate vicinity of, cities, whereas Kingseat is 9 to 10 miles outwith the Aberdeen municipal boundary. Furthermore, in each of these four cases, the asylum is licensed for the reception and treatment of private (i.e. paying) patients, whereas Kingseat Asylum is entirely rate supported, and, receiving as it does only pauper patients, can and does make no profit whatever. As regards the others in the table, six of them do not reach the sum of 3 per bed, and other five vary from 3, 5s. 8d. to 4, 4s. 7d.
But the best comparison obtainable is, it is submitted, that with the Royal Lunatic Asylum at Aberdeen, for it and Kingseat are in the same locality, and it was as a substitute for the accommodation provided in the Royal Lunatic Asylum, where its pauper lunatics were
previously treated, that the appellant Board erected the present asylum at Kingseat. Now, the Royal Lunatic Asylum is licensed for the reception of 830 patients; it is consequently a very much more extensive subject than the asylum at Kingseat. It is...
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