§ A Petition of several Proprietors of Newspapers in Ireland, was presented and read; setting forth,
§ "That from time to time it had been thought expedient by the legislature of Ireland, to lay duties upon advertisements, and down to the last session of parliament, the duty stood at one British shilling for every ten lines of the length of twenty em's of the letter called Long Primer, used in printing; and that notwithstanding this duty, when charged upon long advertisements, increased to a degree considerably exceeding the duty upon advertisements in England, yet the tax in Ireland had been for years progressively increasing, and its operation had been more favourable to the public revenue in the last year than at any preceding; and that an improved spirit in the diurnal press of Ireland, had turned the public attention to the Irish newspapers; and a proportionate desire for advertising, accompanied their extension and popularity; that this growing desire in the public being at the same; time aided by corresponding efforts in the respective proprietors of newspapers to invite advertisements, there was every rational ground to hope that the public revenue would have received progressive accessions of increase, especially as the duty was not so heavy upon advertisements of a moderate length as to discourage the proprietors from inserting many at some risk of ever deriving any advantage from the insertion of them; and that in the last session an act was passed, doubling the tax upon advertisements, which measure had an immediate effect in diminishing the profits of the petitioners; without producing the effect of a proportionate-increase of the public revenue; and that the petitioners have made inquiry into the amount of the duty paid before the tax upon advertisements had been doubled, 1013 and also since, and that from the best information they have been able to obtain, the produce of the duty upon advertisements in the Dublin newspapers alone, from the 5th of January 1810 to the 31st of March next ensuing was 2,137l. 7s. 6d.; and that from the 31st of March to the 30th of June following it amounted to 2,022l. 7s. 6d. making a gross sum in that period of 4,159l. 15s.; and that the new duty commenced on the 16th of July, and including sixteen days of the old duty, the gross amount of the produce of advertisements from the 30th of June to the 30th of September 1810 was 2,175l. 6s. 8d.; from the 30th of September to the 5th of January 1819 the gross duty was 2,755l. 11s. 2d. making a gross sum from the 30th of June 1810 to the 5th of January 1811, of 4,930l. 17s. 10d.; and that although there appears to be an increase in the produce of the double tax of 771l. 2s. 10d. yet this is to be accounted for by the institution of two daily newspapers, and a third published weekly, the duty upon the advertisements contained in which gave a gross sum of 1,000l. 16s. 4d. towards the sum before mentioned of 4,930l. 17s. 10d; and that from the above premises it is conclusive, that if those new newspapers had not been set up subsequent to the 16th of July, the duty upon advertisements, though doubly taxed, would have been less productive than with the old tax; and that a part of this produce is in fact charged upon government proclamations, and therefore does not in reality add any thing to the revenue of the state; and that the petitioners were led to understand that the principle of the tax was to establish a ratio whereby advertisements in Ireland should be subject to two thirds of the duty payable thereon in England, but they find that the scale was to extend no farther than to advertisements under twenty lines; and that, from twenty lines up to any indefinite number, the duty payable in Ire land exceeds that payable in England by a progressive increase; which makes an advertisement, in any of the petitioners papers, of three hundred lines, liable to a duty of 3l., whilst in England it would be subject to but 3s.; and that; from the doubling the tax upon; advertisements, even those persons whose necessities compel them to advertise at any price, limit their insertions to less than half the number of times they would otherwise do, by which practice the revenue is not only 1014 reduced, but the petitioners suffer a material loss; and that the revenue arising from newspapers is also otherwise deeply affected by the decrease of advertisements, in as much as those persons who incur the expence of advertising are always interested, and therefore peculiarly anxious to promote the circulation of such papers as contain their advertisements; that also a very numerous class of readers were accustomed to purchase newspapers chiefly for the information to be derived from the advertising columns, to which class, by reason of the decrease in the advertisements in consequence of the additional tax, newspapers have lost a principal recommendation; the joint effect of which is a diminution of the circulation of newspapers, and a serious reduction of that part of the revenue which arises from the duty upon newspaper stamps, amounting to considerably more than the additional tax upon advertising was ever estimated to produce; and that so considerably has the public desire to advertise their general and particular wants through the medium of the newspapers abated, that, even if the duty were reduced to its former rate, it would require some time and inducement to bring back the fugitive business to its former standard; and for this purpose, they conceive that the revenue would be rendered more productive by a moderate rate of duty than the present, which bears no proportion to the means of the general class of advertisers: and that the periodical press of Ireland labours under hardships and obstructions peculiar to itself, not only in consequence of the duty on' advertisements in Ireland being commonly four, six, and frequently ten times greater than that imposed upon advertisements of the same length in England, but also because the proprietors are deprived of various advantages enjoyed by the English proprietors of newspapers; and that they particularly refer to the discount allowed On the payment of their stamp duties respectively; the Irish proprietor being allowed only one and a half per cent. discount, to Which it was reduced the last session of parliament, while the allowance in England is upwards of seventeen and a half percent.; and praying the House to reestablish the former rate of taxation upon advertisements, viz. one shilling British for every ten line, and further to limit that duty, so that in on case it shall exceed the sum an advertisement of the same number of lines 1015 would be liable to England and also that such regulations may be made with respect to the discount allowed on newspaper stamps in Ireland as may place the petitioners upon an equal footing with the proprietors of newspapers in England."
§ Ordered to lie upon the table.