AIR. DISRAELI’S FINANCIAL STATEMENT.

New Zealander, Volume 9, Issue 731, 16 April 1853, Page 3

AIR. DISRAELI’S FINANCIAL STATEMENT.

House of Commons, Friday, Dec. 5. The Chancellor of the Exchequer prefaced his observations by remarking that his statement was made under peculiar circumstances, and would embrace topics not strictly of a financial character, besides that only two-thirds of the financial year had been completed, lie begged the House not to decide precipitately on any part of his statement, but to consider it as a whole. He proposed first to enter upon an examination of the claims of such interests as laboured under burthens and grievances which recent legislation bad rendered unbearable by them—he alluded to the shipping, sugar, and agricultural interests. It was not wise to allow any interest in the country to find what it believed to he well-founded complaints unredressed. As regarded the shipping interest, Government considered that since the repeal of the Navigation Laws, it had been subjected to burdens and grievances it ought not to be made to endure. That interest complained of the system of light dues, of passing tolls, of pilotage, of Admiralty grievances, of the mode of manning the navy, with men from the mercantile marine, of salvage, of the regulations for anchorage, of the restriction on manning vessels, and of the stamps on the marine insurances. To meet these grievances, so that the claims of the shipping interest might not disturb future legislation, Government proposed as follows : confine the light dues to payment for benefit actually received by the ship, and abolish passing tolls, ibis relief would cost the country £IOO,OOO a year. As to the system of pilotage, which was very anomalous, Government would recommend the appointment of a committee to report on the question. In regard to Admiralty grievances, he adverted to the enlistment of our mercantile sailors at a foreign port into our Royal Navy, and proposed that no man so enlisting should receive his wages till the rest of the merchant crew were paid oif; and if by such enlistment any injury should be done to the merchant captain the country should remunerate him. As to salvage, which grievously affected the mercantile marine, Government would recommend that the present system should entirely cease. As regarded anchorage, it also proposed that no merchant vessel should henceforth be disturbed by the paramount claims of the navy. The restrictions on the manning mercantile vessels were indefensible in principle, and he believed not beneficial in practice, and the time was at hand when they must cease, but the question must be considered with reference to the manning of the royal navy. Government hoped shortly to submit measures on the latter subject that would satisfy the House. The present system in the navy was most absurd, but there was no reason why our navy should not be rendered the most efficient in the world. He hoped, therefore, the shipping interest would not press the question at this moment. The stamps on insurances was a financial question, and not one to be treated at that moment. Suinarising the foregoing proposals, be proceeded to the claims of the sugarproducing colonies—claims which, he hoped, would be considered without reference to question of j arty or of the past. He thought the West India colonies had been unwisely and unjustly treated, and they had been made unnecessarily to suffer. The claims of those colonies were that we should duties on foreign sugar : 2ndly, reduce the duti' 3 on British plantation sugar; 3rdly, guarantee loans to the colonies for emigration and improvement; 4thly, refinement of sugar in bond for home consumption, the duty to be taken on the refined, and not the coarse material : oihly, allow the use of molasses in breweries. On the first and second points he observed, that the question of possible competition between the colonial and the foreign producer was not one of sentiment but of figures, and he adduced statistics to show, from the great increase in our consumption of colonial sugar, considered by itself, and also

considered in comparison with foreign sugar, that there was no necessity for reducing the duties on British plantation sugar, or imposing adifferential duty to prop up the colonial interests. He might be called a traitor or renegade for saying this; but he would ask whether, with the facts before him, any gentleman in the House, could agree,to the tax demanded. On the third point he stated tl at Government had sanctioned and assisted emigration from China to Trinidad, and that as the sums already allotted as loans to British Guiana, Trinidad, and St. Lucia, had not actually been taken up, therefore Government could not propose fresh loans. On the fourth point, the permission desired would be a great boon ; and though there were financial reasons against it, Government was prepared to concede it. The fifth point would come in as a financial consideration. He then proceeded to the question of agricultural burdens, observing that the subject of local taxation bad then to be considered. The principal local burdens were the highway, county, and poor rates. As regarded the first, a bill had been prepared. As to the second, there was no objection to the introduction of the representative principle as regarded the rate-payer, though the gaol and the lunatic asylum question somewhat complicated it. The time, however, might speedily come when Parliament would have to consider the whole subject of punishment. But Government was not prepared to advocate any change in regard to the county rate, which amounted annually to £600,000 only. On the third and great rate—the poor rate —he adverted to the important reduction (25 per cent.) which had taken place in that rate since he addressed the House on the subject in 1819, and in reply to an “illogical cheer” which broke out, he intimated that • ( recent legislation might have nothing to do with the matter.” But the rate of diminution, lie was sorry to say, had ceased, and he read a return to show this ; hut he expressed bis belief that the country was in a prosperous state, and that pauperism would materially diminish. Looking to these arguments, and to the fact that the measure he should propose that night would materially relieve the suffering interest, he was not prepared to recommend any change in the local taxation of the country. Having thus gone into the cases of the three complaining classes, he approached the question of the taxation of the country under the system to which all parties had given their adhesion. Unrestricted competition, he said, was not consistent with restricted industry, and after the general election it had become his duty to consider the application of the principle of that competition to the taxation of the nation. On the principle on which they were all agreed—namely, to enable the people to make head against such competition, we should cheapen the prime necessaries of life. Government was prepared to deal with the malt tax. Beer was a prime necessary of life, highly taxed, under circumstances restrictive of industry. To deal properly, and not in a small manner, with this tax, would be to benefit the consumer, and, in an eminent degree, the agriculturist. The present duty on malt was 2s. 7£d. per bushel, producing five millions of money; and the consumption though increasing was not increasing in anything like due proportion. It was proposed to remit one-half of this duty from the 10th of October next, when stock is to be taken, and to have a uniform duty of on malt, from barley, beer,or bigg. They would a’so do away with the drawback in Scotland, as had been already satisfactorily done in the case of Ireland. He next announced that Government recommended the reduction of the tea duties, not believing that such a step would interfere with the adequate supply of this country. He would make no distinction between black and green, or any other kind of tea. The present duty was 2s. 2]d. per lb., which lie proposed to reduce to a uniform duty of Is. —(applause)—this reduction to be spread, as in the case of the sugar duties, over six years—(murmurs) 4|d. to come off in the first year (which he calculated would increase the consumption by 3,000,000 lbs.), and then to reduce the duty by 2d. a-year until it was down to Is. Expatialing on the social and commercial benefits he expected fiom this step, he went on to deal with the hop duty. There were two duties on hops, the Queen Anne’s and the war duty, of nearly equal amount. It was proposed to take of the latter. .He next stated that he did not believe that the consuming power of the people was, as had been asserted, diminishing, despite the results of emigration, which he could not regard as a weakening of the mother country. Such powers depended not upon numbers but upon condition. Nor could he agree that there had been any other rise in the rate of wages than one by which the public would be benefitted. The employer of capital, moreover, was obtaining it at a rate of interest at which it could never have been before obtained by him. The recent discovery of gold had increased and confirmed credit in ibis country, and he believed that the present rate of interest would continue, depending as it did on permanent conditions. He had thus, the Chancellor of the Exchequer said, having then spoken for three hours, indicated reductions of revenue to the amount of between three and four millions sterling ; but in a few months another great source of income was about to cease—the income-tax. On this subject a decision must now be made. Referring to his own financial statement of last year, and avowing his adherence to the principle therein laid down—namely, that the property tax ought to be made as direct as possible, he began with the case of Ireland. Reviewing the short-coming of Ireland, as a contributor to the national purse, he proposed to extend the property and income tax to Irish funded property and salaries. The Consolidated Annuities question would be considered on its merits, the Government not being bound to the recommendation of a Committee of the House of Lords. Government were prepared to recognize a distinction between permanent and precarious income. They would not recommend any increase of the income tax in any schedule. They proposed to exempt all industrial incomes under ill (JO a year. Upon incomes arising from property the exemption point was to be £SO. On schedules 8., D., and E., the rate was to be taken at s£d., and the farmer’s profits (B.) were to he taken at one-third, instead of one-half. A special provision relieving the clergymen with an income under £IOO a-year would be in'roduced. After staling the figures at which he estimate! each department, taking Ireland at the modest sum of £600,000, he said that the general result of the tax would be about the same as at present, and therefore the question would not affect the estimates for the year. He then said that he should soon have to lay before the House a supplementary estimate in regard to our national defences, Government was about to propose no inconsiderable increase of the e-limates. The measures to be proposed Had nothing to do with peace or war, and would have been brought forward under any circnms'ances. The nation had arrived at the conviction that the defences of the country ought to be completed, and though he believed that the predominant tendencies of the age were in favour of peace, he also believed that what°the Government meant to recommend would have the same tendency. They had determined to do the thing completely, and to put the navy in the condition in which every Englishman desired to see it, and which would place the question of national defence at rest for ever. The additional estimate would be about £600,000. He then entered upon the “ Ways and Means,” and said that the state of the Revenue was extremely favourable. I here had been a slight and an expected decrease in the customs, but the excise had greatly increased, and both the siamps and propoity tax had increased every week. He had last year announced an unexpected surplus of £7U),000 at the ensuing April, but he thought that £500,000 from inland revenue might be added, and that they would be safe in expecting a surplus of £l ,300,000 to £1,400,000. He then said that Government designed, if permitted, to make no inconsiderable reductions in the national expenditure. But to effect this, changes would be necessary in the system of administration ; and he dwelt upon the difficulty of achieving any such changes. Prejudice and skill were both arrayed against reforms. Government was prepared to do what had been so often urged, namely, to bring the whole revenue of the country under the control of Parliament; and he should lay before the House measures of administrative reform. Ho should advocate the abolition of the Public Works Loan Fund Commission. He then stated, in round numbers, Ins estimates for 1853-4, and calculated his surplus at £160,000. He hoped he should never have to take auother vote for the Kaffir war. The Chancellor of the Exchequer (after adusion to the becoming mode in which those who had been aggrieved by recent legislation had urged their claims) went on to say that he felt it bis duty to endeavour to increase the resources of the country. He would not meddle with the details of Customs, nor seek any increase of revenue from Excise. Nor would he propose a new tax, but would ask the House to consider an existing tax. He was going to test whether they were sincere in wishing to relieve the industry of tile country. He would ask the committee to consider the details of the house tax, and after strictures upon its vicious chaiactei, he said that it ought to he extended on the principle applied in ihe case of the income tax. He proposed to extend (he existing tax to houses of £lO per annum. At present, private houses, paid 9d. in the pound, and shops 6d., the exemption beginning at £2O. He would increase the rate in consideration of tne beneficial arrangements simult-neously of Fen d, and sng--1 gested that private houses shall he rated at Is. 6’d.

and shops at Is. The whole of this would amount t6 £17,23,000. Thee extra ways and means for 1853-4 would be £2,500.000 against au extra expenditure of £2,100,000. For that year there would be a surplus of about £400,000, and for the then following year one of about £ou(),000, which he thought a promising prospect. He then announced that he had completed his statement. The Government had proposed nothing but what was practicable, but had not shrunk from examining the whole question. It would have been injudicious to go a step further, and To propose measures he was not prepared immediately to carry out. He hoped that they had not met for war, and trusted for support to measures founded upon a principle calculated to insure the greatest happiness to the greatest number. The Chancellor of the Exchequer then sat down, after an address of five hours and ten minutes. A brief conversation took place. Mr. Goulburn asked information on details; Sir Charles Wood asked time to consider the enormously contemplated scheme; Lord John Russell wanted a day fixed for the resolutions embodying the main proportions; Mr. Hume missed the principle of direct taxation; Colonel Sibthorpe missed Protection; Sir Benjamin Hall would move to extend the income tax to Ireland; Mr. Labouchere reminded the House of his own services in diminishing light dues; Mr. Cayley thanked the Chancellor of the Exchequer for the best budget he had ever heard ; Mr. Clay, for the spirit of the plan; Sir James Duke and Mr. Hudson, for the shipping relief; Mr. Alcock, for malt ; Mr. Frewin, for ships and malt, though he wanted more relief on hops; Mr. Wilson wanted more information on sugar in bond ; Mr. Fitzroy, about marine assurances; Mr. Macgregor would cut down tea at once to Is, The general effect of the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s replies was, that information on details should be given hereafter; that resolutions should be tabled on Monday; and that the sense of the House might be taken on Friday next. The motion was agreed to, and the House adjourned Monday, Dec. 6. Committees of Supply. Mr. Gladstone observed, that before the house tax could be considered, it was necessary to know what was to be done with the income tax, the changes in which involved a formidable question of principle, which would raise a strenuous opposition. The report was agreed to, and the House wont into Committee of Supply, when the Naval Estimates were agreed to. A vote towards the purchase of land for a National Gallery was also agreed to; and also a vote of £BO,OOO for the funeral of the late Duke of Wellington, after a sharp deba'e. Several Bills were then road, and the House adjourned.