PRIME MINISTERS’ SALARIES.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 5209, 1 December 1877, Page 2 (Supplement)

PRIME MINISTERS’ SALARIES.

Apropos of Mr. Gladstone’s correction of the statement in “Dod’s Peerage” to the effect that lie was in receipt of a pension of £2OOO a year, the Pali Mall Gazette considers it worth while to recall the fact that tho “ Cabinet pensions ” at the disposal of the Crown arc only four in number, the present holders being. Lord Beaconsfield, Sir George Grey, Mr. Walpole, and Mr. M. Gibson ; payments of Lori Beaconsfield’s being of co-ir.se suspended during his tenure of “an office of emolument.” Each pension is of the value ot £2OOO a-year, the recipient having to make certain declarations in respect of his income previous to accepting it. It may be doubted whether a less lucrative profession than that of au English politician exists under the smi. Lord Russell told a committee of tire House of Commons that he found his salary as Fir t Lord of the Treasury inadequate to meet the expenses entailed on him by his position as Prime Minister. So sensible was the late House of Commons of this fact that it was only at the earnest request of Mr. Gladstone that ins salary as First Lord of the Treasury was not raised to £BOOO a year. Notice had been given by a member of a motion to that effect, and there can be no doubt that it would have been carried, 1 1 former times the case was otherwise. The official gains of Lord Sunderland, while Minister of lames IT., have been estimated at £40,000 a year. At a much later period the younger Pitt, as First Lord of the Treasury, Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Warden of the Cinque Ports, receive I at least £IO,OOO a year, and had two residences rent free. And, perhaps, it Is not too much to say that seventy or eighty years ago £IO,OOO a year went quite as far as, £15,000 a year will go now. Nor., indeed, that Pitt cared for these things. It was only in deference to the almost positive command of George 111. that he accepted the Lord Wardenship of the Cinque Ports, while in 1788-9 he gave a more decided proof of his contempt for money. It was feared that a regency might have the effect of depriving him of power, and the merchants of London made no secret of their intention of raising a sum of £IOO,OOO as a gift to the Minister, Pitt, ou his part, was firmly resolved to decline the present.