BUDGET DUTIES

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2575, 24 September 1915, Page 5

BUDGET DUTIES

SOME ESTIMATES OP 'BEYENUE PRICE OP FOODSTUFFS By fMegranh—Press Association—Copyright London, September 22. A Treasury statement estimates that tho year's duty on hats will produce £80,000; on watches, £180,000; on musical instruments, £40,000; on plateglass, £60,000; on cinema films, £40,000; on clocks, £40,000; on motorcars, £1,160,000; on patent medicines, £250,000; ou motor spirit, £20,000; on tobacco, £10,000. SUPPLIES OF FOODSTUFFS. London, September 22. Replying in the House of Commons to questions regarding the increase in the price of foodstuffs, Sir. Runoiman, President of the Board of Agriculture, said that the Government measures had secured "a good supnly of _ meat from the Argentine and Australia to assure the country against a dangerous shortage. During tho course of the next twelve months, the Board of Trade's operations in food would amount to 50 mil-lions-sterling. They had not allowed the American Trust, to get all it asked for or shipowners to get all they wanted. Such was the French Government's confidence in our conduct of business that it had placed the whole matter in the Board of Trade's hands. So far as tho Board oould ascertain, there had been no withholding of supplies. The price of wheat was now low, and would probably have been lower still had the Dardanelles been opened. . An_ abundant harvest would tend to keep prices down.

ECONOMIES IN PUBLIC WORKS. The Right Hon. Lewis Harcourt, First Commissioner of Works, .stated tliat tlie Government. was effecting economies in the Oifice of Works representing a quarter of a million pounds this year and half a million-next year. "PERFECTLY SPLENDID•• (Rec. September 23, 9.50 p.m.) Paris, September 23. The British Budget produced an enormous effect in political and business circles. The public was struck by the simplicity aaid absence of fuss with which the gigantic operation was carried out. "Perfectly splendid," was the verdict of a leading manufacturer^ Tho "Liberto" expresses the opinion that the beauty of the thing lies in the hugeness of the burdens which the House of Commons unanimously voted at a single sitting. "People who are animated by such magnificent determination are invincible." 1

■ THE FRENCH BUDGET COST OF THE WAR £82,000,000 A MONTH (Rec. September 23, 9.50 p.m.) Paris, September 23. The French Budget Commission reports that the cost of the war up to the present is £1,200,000,000 sterling. The expenditure is £82,000,000 a month. ALMOST A FIASCO THIRD GERMAN WAR LOAN. By Telegraph—Press Association—Oopyriel. (Rec. September 24, 0.40 a.m.) Amsterdam, September 23. Telegrams from Berlin state that the third war loan has closed with an unsatisfactory result, being only just covered. German financiers are uneasy over the prospects of future war loans.