PUBLIC FINANCES.

HC Deb 13 February 1840 vol 52 cc184-229

Mr. Herries

rose, in pursuance of the notice he had given to move for— Account of the income of the consolidated fund, including therewith the duties on sugar, and of the charges thereupon, in the year 1839; distinguished under the principal heads of receipt and expenditure; and also an estimate of the same for the year 1840; showing in each case the surplus applicable to the supplies voted by Parliament. Account showing the amount of the deficiency bills charged on the growing produce of the consolidated fund outstanding, unsatisfied on the 14th day of February, 1839, and the 14th day of February, 1840, respectively. Account showing the surplus or deficiency of the net income of the United Kingdom, compared with the expenditure thereof (exclusive of the charge for a fixed sinking fund, while such was imposed by law), in each of the five years preceding the 5th day of January, 1831, and also in each of the five years preceding the 5th day of January, 1840. Account showing the total amount of the funded or unfunded debt created, and also of the funded or unfunded debt extinguished, in each of the three years preceding the 5th day of January, 1840, distinguishing the stock created in lieu of Exchequer-bills cancelled, being the produce of monies invested by savings-banks. Account of the total amount of the unfunded debt outstanding on the 5th day of January, the 5th day of April, the 5th day of July, and the 10th day of October, in each of the years 1837, 1838, and 1839, stating the rate of interest on Exchequer-bills issued at or about the same periods, the current rates of premium or discount on the same in the public market, and the prices of the Three per Cent. Consolidated Annuities. Account of the total net income and expenditure of the United Kingdom, in each of the twelve years between the 5th day of January, 1828, and the 5th day of January 1840, in continuation of the account annexed to the fourth report of the committee on finance in 1828, wherein the same is exhibited from the year 1792. The right hon. Gentleman said he regretted, that he should be under the necessity of trespassing upon the patience of the House for some time, but he promised to be as brief as he possibly could, consistently with the nature and importance of the subject he was about to introduce to their attention. He was sorry, indeed, that he should be called upon to make any statement on this occasion, for he had hoped, that considering the circumstances under which he called for the information described in the motion, the right hon. Gentleman opposite (the Chancellor of the Exchequer), would have spared him and the House the trouble of a lengthened address upon the subject, and of any exposition of the state of the public finances. It was only because he understood, that his motion would be opposed, that he felt it indispensably necessary to trouble the House on this occasion. In the first place, he would request the attention of hon. Members to the general scope of his motion, and to the general nature of the papers which were comprised in it; and he did this for the purpose of clearing his way, and of enabling him more effectually to fulfil the promise which he had made with regard to brevity. Of all the papers mentioned in his motion, only one was contested, and indeed only a part of that one. With respect to all the rest, he thought it his duty to state, that he did not move for them without the intention of making use of them hereafter. Those papers, undoubtedly, had a tendency to call in question the conduct of the Government as to their financial arrangements; but the questions which might arise on them might, with the greatest convenience to the House, and without any immediate disadvantage, be postponed to a future occasion. He should merely notice one of them at that moment—namely, that which related to the management of the unfunded debt, and which would enable the House hereafter to judge whether or not the right hon. Gentleman opposite, and the noble who had preceded him, had conducted that most important branch of public money to the general ad- vantage. He thought, that he should be able to show by that document, most satisfactorily to the House and the country, that there had been in that department of the public Administration, a great degree of mismanagement. He understood, that no opposition was to be made to any of the other papers. The paper to which an objection was to be made, and upon which the House would most probably be called upon to declare "ay" or "no" whether it should be produced or not, was that relating to the income of the consolidated fund for 1840, as stated in the first paragraph of the motion. The object of asking for that estimate, was to arrive at a knowledge of the pecuniary resources of the country for the present year. It was to that paper that all his arguments would now be addressed. He had thus particularly adverted to what he did require, in order to guard against any misstatements, and again being understood to ask for that which he did not require. He did not call upon the Chancellor of the Exchequer at the present period of the Session, and before what the right hon. Gentleman would term his "financial year" had expired, to state the whole of his prospective arrangements with respect to the supplies and the ways and means of the year. It might be presumed, that he considered it too early to call for that statement; and his motion did not ask for it, but only required, that the House should have before it forthwith, or at least at the earliest opportunity, a correct view of the income of the country in the present year. It was fair to state, that the accounts of the past year had been laid before the House; and he would endeavour to satisfy the House that what he now asked for, and what the Chancellor of the Exchequer refused, ought to be insisted on, if the House meant to discharge its duty to the country. He might be told, that it was not usual or customary to call for such statements as this; and that it was at least wrong to ask for it at the present period of the Session. Why, if the present state of things was the usual and customary state, if the financial affairs of the country were in their ordinary condition, if there was nothing peculiar and unprecedented in the state of financial matters, he might perhaps on the present occasion, as in former years, forbear, and act like other Gentlemen who sat on the same side of the House with him, who had exercised a great forbearance in not asking for information on the subject. A very good return had been made for that forbearance. Those to whom it had been shown had greatly abused it; they had resisted every attempt at inquiry. There had been a systematic determination to avoid inquiry; and year after year they had pushed the financial question from the early to the very latest part of the Session, to July or August, and then only bringing it forward after repeated solicitation and remonstrance. He asked the House if that was not true? And he asked the House too, in what light the country must view this matter, and how they would answer it to their constituents, if that practice were to be continued through such an unexampled Session as this? Was there nothing peculiar at present in the financial affairs of the country? He was determined to avoid as much as possible, and he thought he should almost wholly succeed, resting his case on technical financial propositions. His motion was founded on broad, simple, and intelligible principles, requiring nothing but clear straightforward argument to support it, and no figures to enforce it. But he must refer to what took place on a former evening, when the hon. Member for Kilkenny cast a reproach on the Gentlemen who sat on the Opposition benches for not supporting him in his endeavour to press the Government on the subject of finances. The reproach was offered in good part, and received without any display of unkindness. But if the Opposition were called upon to excuse themselves to the House and the country for their forbearance, it might be right for him to mention one of the motives which had influenced him, and which he knew had influenced those with whom he had the honour to act, in refraining from pressing the Government on questions touching the financial condition of the country. During the last two years—and he might go further back than that—it was well known to all whom he was addressing that the monied interests of this country were in a most critical condition, and that the mercantile classes were labouring under the greatest anxiety and solicitude, pending alarms and dangers, which, Heaven be praised, were not fully realized. Under those circumstances, it was desirable not to agitate the subject. It appeared to (the Opposition) that it was not then the time to press the Chancellor of the Exchequer to make statements or disclosures, the effect of which might be mischievous elsewhere, with relation to the state of the revenue. But was that the case at present? Were they still under ap- prehension and alarm that distrust might be excited by anything that might fall from hon. Gentlemen on that side of the House? All fear on that ground had been put an end to by declarations which had proceeded from the highest authority. Nothing, that he could state or unfold, could exhibit to the world the miserable condition of the public finances with half the effect which was produced by the announcement of the noble Lord who was at the head of her Majesty's Government, and the noble Lord opposite (Lord J. Russell). They were persons who might be deemed able to judge in the matter, and they had thought fit to make those statements frankly, and fully, and without reserve; so that the House and the country were now in possession of the fact of the state of the public finances. As those statements must have more effect than any he could make, he would read them to the House in the very words of those who had made them, with this remark, that they formed the very essence and ground of his motion. On an occasion when certain inquiries and observations were made elsewhere, and which might now be undoubtedly referred to as matters of notoriety, certain statements were made by the first Minister of the Crown, and the first Minister of that department which was peculiarly the subject of examination, they being the persons the most competent within these realms, from their situation and knowledge, to form an opinion on the matter, and to publish it to the world. To those statements he would now call the attention of the House. On the 23rd day of January, in the present year, Lord Melbourne, in answer to some observations which had been made by the Earl of Ripon, said— The noble Lord had called public attention to what he rightly held to be a subject of the most pre-eminent importance. He should always concur in that opinion. He could not but express his entire concurrence in all that had been stated by his noble Friend, and in almost all the facts that he had stated. He entirely agreed with him in the approbation which he had expressed of the sinking fund—and that was very material indeed—as it was in the administration of the noble Duke, and he entirely agreed with him in the extremely disagreeable state of the financial affairs. That was fair, and frank, and true. He admitted to his noble Friend, that a deficiency continuing year after year, growing and increasing, was a state of things which could not be permitted to go on, and it was a financial state of the country which it was necessary to look boldly in the face, and to take such measures as were necessary for avoiding of the evil and doing away of the danger. Nothing could be more proper than that. He was afraid it must be admitted, that not being able to look into futurity, and looking at the state of affairs adverted to by his noble Friend, there could be no material diminution of expense upon any of the points to which he had alluded. He did not fairly see any probability of any government being able greatly to diminish the expense of the military or naval force. That last observation was one of great importance. He trusted that at a time when the safety of the country required the public establishments to be kept up, a diminution in any of them would not be amongst the expedients which the right hon. Gentleman would resort to in order to relieve the public finances. The statements of the noble Lord at the head of her Majesty's Government were most explicit, and nothing remained but to find a remedy for the evil. But those statements had received confirmation from a quarter which was entitled to the greatest attention—from a noble person second in importance to the Prime Minister. The noble Lord, the leader in that House, with equal candour and fairness, on a recent occasion informed the House that he feared the necessities of the country were such as would require the imposition of increased burdens. This was the noble Lord's language:— He feared the necessities of the country were such as would require increased burdens: that the finances were so much impaired, that the public service could not be carried on without augmented means. The finances of the country now presented such an aspect, and things had now arrived at such a pass, that it became the imperative duty of a faithful House of Commons to look the affairs of the nation in the face, and this he conceived to be a duty especially binding upon that House, at a moment when their financial affairs were in a state, which he did not scruple to designate as most dangerous. The duty which the House would have to perform was one of an extremely painful nature, and the painfulness of that duty was in no slight degree increased by the reflection, that we were now in the twenty-sixth year of peace. He called upon the House to address themselves to this question with the best meaning; he did so under a strong sense of duty, and influenced mainly by the feeling that the public safety was paramount to all other considerations. He apprehended that his motion might be ob- jected to on the ground that it was unusual; he admitted that it was unusual, but had he not stated circumstances enough, peculiar to the present occasion, to render the case, which he had made out, more than commensurate with any want of precedents? He found that Chancellors of the Exchequer, in former times, had not withheld from the House the information which he now sought from the right hon. Gentleman on the Treasury bench. In Lord Ripon's time, when that noble Lord filled that office during the first three years of his chancellorship, a period in which he (Mr. Herries) had an humble share in the duties of that department, the practice was to lay before the House very early in the month of February, a statement of the income and expenditure, and an estimate of the probable income and expenditure of the current year. Lord Althorp followed that example, and during the first year that he filled that office, so early as the 11th of February—within two days of the time at which he then spoke—that noble Lord was accustomed to lay information of this description before the representatives of the people. It was the practice of that noble Lord, quite as early in the year as the present day, to present to the House a statement and estimate of the ordinary finances of the year, and that, too, in a printed form. It might be said, that those were statements made merely in the House during discussions, but not laid upon the table in consequence of any order of the House. He apprehended, however, that that distinction was altogether immaterial, and afforded no just grounds for refusing the information which he sought. In fact, the very last Chancellor of the Exchequer made a statement of the kind to which he was referring. That right hon. Gentleman, now Lord Monteagle, made a financial statement in the month of July, and subsequently opened a little budget much to the surprise of those who heard him in the month of August following. The statement upon which his speeches were founded had been printed, and did include information of the nature now demanded, though it came at a somewhat later period of the year; that was a satisfactory paper in manner, notwithstanding that its contents were anything but satisfactory. That statement was accompanied by an estimate of the probable income and expenditure to the then end of the revenue year—namely, to the 5th of January next following. Now he desired no more than to have the same thing for the year 1840. He had not overlooked the possible observation that he made this demand at a much earlier period of the year, than that at which the last Chancellor of the Exchequer furnished his statement; but let it be recollected that he asked it only to the end of the revenue year, he did not require it from the 5th of April to the 5th of April, the full financial year, but merely required a few months earlier than last year, that which had been given in many preceding sessions so early as the month of February, and which he conceived to be, in the present circumstances of the country, a matter of the utmost urgency and importance. He begged hon. Gentlemen on the other side to recollect that he did not ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer for any statement of the new taxes which he intended to propose—he called for no disclosure of the extraordinary resources, by means of which he hoped to be able to carry the country through its present financial difficulties—he did not ask the right hon. Gentleman to publish to the House, or to the country, an account of the Exchequer bills which he meant to pay off, or those which he intended to issue; but under the existing circumstances of the nation he demanded—during the present well-founded distrust and alarm—that the House of Commons should be furnished with that which alone could form the only sound basis of financial operations—namely, the best view which, at the present moment, it was in the power of the Government to supply, of the circumstances in which the country stood with reference to its finances. Was it too much to ask that light should be let in upon a state of things respecting which the public were as yet ignorant and uninformed, but at the same time most anxious for all the knowledge that could be obtained, and certainly entitled to all that might be communicated without injury to her Majesty's service? The House of Commons ought not to be called to wait for any future, and, perhaps, distant time. It was impossible that they now could wait without being guilty of a gross breach of the trust reposed in them by their constituents. The conditions and prospects of the country were such as to render the information which he sought of immense importance. There existed with reference to it extreme solicitude in the public mind. There was no society into which he went that he did not hear inquiries made, surmises hazarded, and a universal anxiety mani- fested; there was no person with whom he conversed that did not appear full of apprehension as to the prospects of the country—he need hardly suggest that our interests at home and abroad would be in the highest degree affected by the state of our finances. If there were no other ground of alarm, it might be found in the admission of that highest authority in the country, the first Minister of the Crown, who promulgated the alarming fact that he was himself as much aware as any man could be of the embarrassments of our financial condition. Abroad and at home it was a state of things which must be productive of the most deplorable results. In the midst of such embarrassments, how could any government hope to maintain tranquillity at home or respect abroad—how could they hope to keep the Chartists quiet—how prevent the encroachment of foreign powers, unless they could show that they possessed the means of maintaining establishments adequate to the exigencies of the state? He presumed that it would be needless for him further to enlarge upon the deep interest which every man in the country felt, and, of necessity, must feel, in the present state of affairs. He should observe that it was most material, in the first place, to ascertain the extent of the evil before they were called upon to adopt any measures for its correction; and, for this purpose, the House ought to be, at the earliest possible moment, put in possession, as far as it was possible to do so, of all the knowledge which the Government had of its own resources, and of the extent to which it was likely those resources would be drawn upon; always, of course, confining the communication to such matters as might be made known without detriment to the public service. An alarming deficiency was apprehended; it therefore became the duty of the House of Commons to consider the means which were to be proposed for making due provision for that deficiency, and not be called upon some months hence to do, in haste, and without investigation, that which above all things required caution and deliberation. It would be felt that, standing as he did at that side of the House, and, therefore, having no access to official documents, it was not for him to present either an estimate of the resources of the year, or a financial statement; but he might set forth some additional reasons why the information for which he moved ought not to be refused. He should not enter into minute details; he should merely submit to the House a few statements in round numbers, which might perhaps bring to the minds of hon. Members the position in which the country was placed, and which, he agreed with the first Minister of the Crown, was "a most disagreeable" condition of the public finances. He intended merely to sail their attention to the occurrences of the last three years, and he confined his observations to the period from January to January, and not from April to April. Taking, then, the financial accounts from January to January, and looking back to the returns of the statement for 1837, he found that there was a deficiency on the produce of the revenue to meet the expenditure to the amount of 726,000l. He found that in 1838 there was a further deficiency of the same kind, which amounted to 440,000l.; thus making together the sum of 1,166,000l., as the amount of the deficiency which existed at the close of 1838. In the year 1839 it appeared, from the accounts recently laid on the Table of the House, there was a further deficiency, which amounted to no less a sum than 1,512,000l., making altogether a deficiency at the end of the year 1839 of the large sum of 2,678,000l. Under these circumstances, was he not justified in asking and pressing for an account of what was likely to be the amount of deficiency arising during the present year. When they looked to the present state of affairs, was not every one most anxious to know from the best authority what were the financial expectations for the year 1840? In addition also to the deficiency which he had stated, it was likely to be increased in consequence of the additional charge of some of the great establishments of the country. He was bound to make the best estimates that he could from the returns on the Table of the House; and from the extent of information furnished to them in these documents, he was enabled to form what he believed to be a tolerably correct estimate on the subject. Taking, then, merely one of the great charges of expenditure, he found that in the navy estimates for the present year there was an increased charge for that branch of the service amounting to 500,000l. He would ask whether it was not reasonable to expect that when a deficiency in the revenue of the country to the amount of 1,500,000l. was allowed to occur in the year 1839, that unless means were taken to prevent the deficiency it would to the same extent occur again? He wished that it might not be the case, but he feared that there was nothing in the state of affairs at present that would justify him in supposing that there would not be a deficiency to a similar extent in the present year. Under these circumstances he felt himself justified in assuming that a deficiency to this amount would also occur in 1840. But in addition to the deficiency of 1,500,000l. which arose in 1839, there was an additional charge on the revenue of the country for the present year for the augmentation in the navy, and therefore the sum of 500,000l. must be added to the former amount, which would make the deficiency for the present year amount to the sum of 2,000,000l. Thus, supposing that there was no reason to expect any further increased charge, or any other further deficiency, the amount at the end of the year 1840 would be found to be 4,678,000l. He wished that this was all, but this, he feared, was not the extent of the difficulty which they would have to encounter. He was not about to enter into a calculation as to any pecuniary expenses which were incurred last year, and which might or might not be incurred this year. He was bound to state his views on the subject to the extent of the information before him, because he was called upon to go into the subject, and make a statement in consequence of the opposition made to this motion for returns by the right hon. Gentleman. But he had hitherto made no mention of another probable cause of deficiency in the revenue, which unquestionably was of great importance, and to which the Government had exposed the public revenue in the present year; he had not yet said one word respecting the great question of the revenue of the Post-office. Whatever deficiency occurred from this source of revenue must be added to the amount which he had already stated, and he ventured, to the best of his judgment, from the papers on the Table, to form an estimate of what this would probably be, and he trusted that the right hon. Gentleman would correct him if he was wrong; but he thought that he was justified in saying, and he was to some extent acquainted with the Post-office, that there would be a loss of revenue of from 1,200,000l. to 1,400,000l., by the change in the system of postage. All the information that had been furnished by the authorities of the Post-office justified this estimate. He had estimated the loss at, from 1,200,000l. to 1,400,000l., and this he had been informed, by persons very familiar with the subject, was a moderate estimate of the loss; and, for his own part, he had no doubt but that he should be able to justify this estimate. If, then, they took the smaller sum, and added 1,200,000l. for the deficiency in the revenue of the Post-office for the year, they would have a deficiency at the close of 1840 amounting to very nearly six millions. Was this a state of things under which the House should remain quiet? Was this a state of things which the House should pass by with feelings of satisfaction, and allow the right hon. Gentleman at his time and at his pleasure to state how he meant to deal with this increasing deficiency in the revenue. He could not believe, that the House would consent to anything of the kind, and he entertained the strongest conviction that when he put the motion into the hands of the Speaker, and when the question was put "aye," or "no," that the "ayes" would have it. The subject of the Post office he felt that it was impossible to pass over without some observations on the extraordinary conduct of the Government with respect to that question, it was a proceeding which operated to produce an increase of the evil complained of—it was an aggravation of a most wanton kind of a state of things which it was their duty to change as soon as possible. At the commencement of the year 1840, and with a knowledge of the financial difficulties which then existed, and with the increased expenditure which was likely to arise—with all this knowledge the Government chose to introduce this system. No Government ever before introduced and carried into effect a plan of the kind, under such extraordinary circumstances, and in the embarrassed state of the finances. And this was done, not from any conviction of the soundness of the policy of the proceeding, but merely in consequence of the momentary circumstances in which they were placed. He said this with confidence when he recollected the opinions which had been expressed on the subject, both here and in another place, by members of the Government, and which showed him, that great doubts were entertained as to the success of the plan. Lord Melbourne, who introduced the bill into the House of Lords last year, among other things said, For the last year, and, indeed, for the last two years, the income of the country had not been equal to its expenditure; and this had not arisen from any falling off in the revenue, but was owing to the great increase that had arisen in the public expenditure. He might be asked, then, in the present state of the revenue, with a tendency to the increase of the expenditure, how he could venture to tamper with so large a sum as that derivable from the Post-office revenue. This was a most natural question, and it was answered in a most extraordinary manner. The noble Lord proceeded. He certainly felt the force of the objection, and his answer to this was, that in the first place, the very general feeling and general concurrence of all parties in favour of the plan, and there was such a general demand from all classes of the community for a measure of this nature, that it was a very difficult matter to withstand it. This, then, was all the apology that they had from the prime minister of the Crown for aggravating the financial difficulties to the amount of 1,400,000l. a year, and when he knew the extent of the deficiency that already existed. He did this because he "found it a difficult matter to withstand," and where did he find the difficulty? Not in Parliament. Would he have found the difficulty in withstanding Parliament on the subject? He knew that he could have induced the Parliament to withstand this inconvenient proposal, which was carried by the noble Lord, then Chancellor of the Exchequer. He must have been aware that he could have induced the Parliament to withstand this dangerous proposition, that had been pressed upon the Government from without and from within. If he had looked to the gentlemen of England for support, and had asked them whether they would sanction a measure which would increase the deficiency in the revenue, he would have had no deficiency of supporters. He was sure that all parties, on such an appeal being made to them, would regard it as a matter of sound policy to oppose such a plan until more, favourable circumstances arose for carrying it into execution. He was not speaking against the scheme itself—he was not stating that this reduction in the revenue might not be desirable under other circumstances—he offered no opinion on this point—and as to what might have been prudent or advisable to do on the subject, when the finances of the country were in a favourable condition, and when they had a large surplus to deal with, and to insure them against any deficiency in the revenue—such a surplus, for instance, as the noble Lord opposite commended the Duke of Wellington's government for maintaining —and entertaining that opinion, it was extraordinary that he could be a party to come forward with such a proposition. He did not hesitate to say, that the proposition was inconvenient and dangerous, and Lord Melbourne and his Government must have been aware of this, and must know that the carrying it at that time could only add to the great difficulties of the finances. In sanctioning such a measure they abandoned all sound—he had almost said—all honest policy for the Government itself never had confidence as to the result of this scheme. They never believed that this was a wise plan—they never were convinced that it would prove advantageous, for they resisted it strongly when it was first proposed. When the Government gave way, what was the secret influence which induced them to abandon their former conviction as to the alleged inconvenience attending the adoption of the plan? That they might keep their offices, they entered into this compact, and by this sacrifice of their opinions and principles on the subject, they might get certain votes. In introducing this measure to the House, the Government admitted that there was a risk of great danger; and the late Chancellor of the Exchequer brought it forward in the House with evident reluctance, and he satisfied his own conscience by the most extraordinary expedient for that purpose that ever minister of state consented to make. He told the House, that he was afraid that it knew that this measure would be delusive in its consequences; but the remedy which he proposed as a security was, that he would take a pledge from the House of giving him an equivalent for the revenue that he should lose. They had now lost the revenue, and, at the same time, had got rid of the pledge. When would the the House be called upon to redeem this pledge? Independent of this pledge, there was another very large source of deficiency in the revenue, which it would be the duty of the House to fill up, and remove, he hoped, during the present Session. He said that he hoped, for nothing was so objectionable as the attempt that had recently been made to carry on the public service of the country by means of peace loans. He could hardly conceive any thing more baneful than to exhibit England to the world as being in such a lamentable condition, and her finances on such a dangerous footing, as to carry on the government by means of peace-loans. For his own part, such proceedings in our finances should never cease to meet with his most strenuous opposition. If he was told that it was necessary to resort to this expedient, he would remind the House, that the finances of the country had been reduced to this unfortunate state, not without warning, for they had been constantly cautioned against this reduction of the revenue, by those on his side of the House, who took a prominent part in discussions on the finances of the country. His right hon. Friend, the Member for the University of Cambridge, had never failed to repeat his cautions to the Government, against the dangerous practice of sacrificing the revenue to popular demands for the reduction of taxes. His right hon. Friend, the Member for Tam worth, also, had given a caution on this subject to Lord Althorp, when that noble Lord brought forward his last budget. The language which his right hon. Friend used on the occasion was most emphatic language, in cautioning the noble Lord against the dangerous nature of the proceeding, in reducing taxes merely in consequence of a popular demand; he added, "that he was sure that any one in the situation of the noble Lord must be aware of the difficulty between repealing old taxes and imposing new ones." If they looked back through the twenty-six years during which peace had existed, they would until comparatively recently, find that a surplus revenue had always been maintained. This was the case during every portion of that time, except one, until within the last five, or rather the last three years. From the year 1816 until 1828, when the Finance Committee sat, the revenue had been kept in such a state as to satisfy the anxiety of those who were anxious for a large surplus income; and this had been found, during that time, sufficient to effect a large reduction in the national debt. In the report of that Committee, with which he was sure, that the right hon. Gentleman was familiar, it was shown, that in the period of peace, between 1817 and 1828, there had been a reduction of 3,500,000l. on the charge of the debt, while in the same time 26,000,000l. of taxes had been taken off. There was something consolatory in the view of the finances of the country at that time; and his right hon. Friend, the Member for the University of Cambridge, who then had the management of the Exchequer, took care that the revenue should not be in such a state that there was any chance of a deficient income. While his right hon. Friend held the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer, he reduced the taxes to the amount of between 6,000,000l. and 7,000,000l. a year, and still left a surplus revenue to his successor, Lord Althorp, of 3,000,000l. Lord Althorp had always been in favour of a small surplus revenue, and he had proposed to reduce a number of taxes, but still he retained a clear surplus revenue of 500,000l. a year. The only deficiency of the public revenue antecedent to the time when Gentlemen apposite came into office was when Lord Althorp was Chancellor of the Exchequer. The hasty reduction of taxes occasioned this, and the deficiency that arose then, to the amount of about 1,000,000l., was made up by increased revenue in the following year, so that no great public inconvenience resulted from it. There was no continued deficiency from that time until 1837; that was, there was no actual and permanent deficiency of revenue. He had already, stated to the House, that Lord Althorp had always been opposed to their having a very considerable surplus for the reduction of debt; and in introducing his first budget, he proposed a reduction of some taxes, and a substitution of others, but so that the surplus should be reduced from 3,000,000l, to about 500,000l., which he stated was going rather too near the margin, and that there was some danger in it. But what was the conduct of Lord Althorp when he found, that he could not carry some of the taxes which he proposed to substitute in lieu of those to be taken off? That noble Lord, having a just regard for the enormous danger which might arise from a constant deficiency in the revenue of the country, when pressed to reduce some of the taxes which he had proposed to do without having a surplus, strenuously resisted the proposition. It would have been congenial to the feelings of Lord Althorp to have adopted some of these great reductions in taxes; but no pressure from within or without could compel or induce him to sacrifice such an important matter in connection with the revenue of the country as a surplus income, and thus put the public credit of the country in danger. The House must well recollect with what energy that noble Lord adhered to the decided course which he had adopted, when the House was taken by surprise, and agreed to a motion for the reduction of the malt-tax, when the noble Lord declared that he would not remain an hour in office, and place the country in such a dangerous condition as it must be in with a large deficiency in the revenue. Having adverted to the right hon. Gentleman so pointedly before, he thought it but right to say, that the position in which the finances had been was not owing to those who had had the management of the Exchequer, but the evil arose from the wretched policy of the Government. No man could watch the proceedings of the Government without observing, that the noble Lord at the head of the Government in the other House, was a most reluctant executor of many of the tasks imposed on him by his supporters, and that he was forced and driven to support many measures which he was really opposed to by his colleagues in the administration. In addressing the right hon. Gentleman as the minister responsible for the finances of the country, he was sure that the right hon. Gentleman would not urge as an excuse from censure, that he had been but recently appointed to the office, as he had only succeeded to a department with which he had long been familiar, and with the details of which he was practically acquainted as well as his predecessor: he therefore should proceed to advert to what had been done for the last year or two. He did not wish to detain the House at much greater length, for he thought that he had already laid a sufficient foundation to justify him in calling for the papers which he required, and more particularly so in the present state of the country. From what he considered to be the duty of the House, he believed there never existed a more solemn obligation in them than at this time, to take proper steps to put a stop to the present financial embarrassments of the country. When he saw the danger staring the country in the face, he felt that he was justified in calling upon the House, at that early period of the session, to require such information as would tend to direct them in that course which it was essential to the interests of the public service should be taken. But before he proceeded further, he must observe, that it was necessary that he should guard the House against relying upon any authority or upon any facts which he should adduce, but to rest upon the statements of members of her Majesty's Government; and when he alluded to the dangerous state of the finances of the country, he would also recommend them to guard themselves against forming an exaggerated or too gloomy view of the general state and situ- ation of the country. What he spoke of was the effect of mismanagement of the Government, of the want of judgment, of firmness, and of skill, which had characterised the present administration. The people of England were not deficient in resources; they were not less able to support the honour and interests of the country, and to ensure its safety than at any former period. He believed that our resources were unimpaired; that, indeed, we were more competent now than at any former period of our history, to make great exertions, if called upon to make them. He utterly repudiated the foolish saying that England was laid prostrate under the weight of its seven hundred millions of debt. When the country was called upon to make good the deficiencies which had arisen, he had not the slightest doubt it would be prepared to do so, and that the wisdom of Parliament would remedy the evils which the folly of the Government had brought upon the country. The right hon. Gentleman concluded by submitting the motion for returns as mentioned in the beginning of his speech.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer

was well aware, that every person in office was ex officio liable to those imputations and charges which, as a Member of the Government, he shared on the present occasion, and he was equally well aware that, in the eyes of the Opposition, there were no motives for bringing forward such a motion as this but those of the purest patriotism, and he was far from desiring to assign any other motives to the right hon. Gentleman; but still he could not conceal from himself, that if all the ingenuity of the right hon. Gentleman had been called into requisition for the purpose of devising a course most embarrassing to those who were at the head of the financial affairs of the country, he could not have been more successful than he had been in preparing the present motion. Before he came to the real point at issue, and before he followed the right hon. Gentleman in some of his observations, he would narrow the question as much as possible by stating what part of the returns he was ready to concede. The part of the motion to which he objected was, for a return "of the estimated income of the consolidated fund for the year 1840." The rest of the returns he was quite willing to give. There remained therefore no question as to any account whatever included in these returns, as there was no objection on the part of the Government to any return whatever, but to that which involved practically that part of the budget which comprised the income of the future year. This, however, was the principal point at which the right hon. Gentleman aimed. He insisted, that at that present moment the Chancellor of the Exchequer should lay before the House what would be the income of the year. The right hon. Gentleman, in the first part of his speech, had sought to justify what he admitted to be an extraordinary motion, by an allegation of what he was pleased to term the systematic evasion on the part of the Government of stating what were their views as to finance; but the right hon. Gentleman had quite upset this justification by subsequent admissions. When it served his turn, the right hon. Gentleman commented on the statements made by his noble Friends, on late occasions; and, in doing so, admitted that nothing could have been more candid, more fair, and more open—such were the words—than the statement of both those noble Lords respecting the position in which they were, and the course which they intended to pursue; and, therefore, when the right hon. Gentleman stated, that the Government displayed a systematic evasion, in stating what were their views regarding finance, he would only ask the House to look to the facts of the case, and the admissions of the right hon. Gentleman. If ever there was a moment when the Ministers of the Crown might well have shrunk from such a declaration as that which had been so manfully made by the noble Lord at the head of the Government, in that and the other House, it was at the moment when the fate of their administration was pending. Yet the very moment before that House went to a division on his fate as a Minister, the noble Lord near him, in language which had been characterised by the right hon. Gentleman opposite as most candid, fair, and open, had stated to the House the difficulties of the financial circumstances of the country, and the determination of the Government to meet them with the firmness and energy which the case required. The right hon. Gentleman stated, that the returns he sought had been furnished on former occasions, but the right hon. Gentleman, unintentionally, no doubt, had probably left a wrong impression on the minds of many hon. Gentlemen, who had not closely attended to all the circumstances, or to the real facts of the precedents which he had brought forward. He stated, that both Lord Ripon and Lord Spencer gave accounts of their financial expectations at an early period of the year. In the first place, as regarded Lord Ripon, it was to be recollected, that the financial year, in his time, began in the month of January, and not, as now, in the month of April, and, consequently, the business of the House was necessarily brought forward at an earlier period of the year than now, but the other circumstances of the case were different. That was not a case of compulsion at all; no opposition called for the course, but the noble Lord took that course which appeared to him to be, under the circumstances, most expedient and best for the public service. Lord Spencer followed the same course, but it was a course which, at the same time, was loudly objected to by all parties highly inconvenient. To call upon the Government to lay the financial statement for the year before the House, at so early a period, on such precedents as these, was quite beside the mark. These accounts, then, having never, in the warmest times of opposition, even during the war, been pressed on Government or granted by Government, it was for the right hon. Gentleman and his Friends to make out a much stronger case than had been made out or their production now. In the first place, he had always understood—and he had learnt it from those whom he was led to think high authorities—that the case of an individual, and the case of a country was quite different. That as regarded an individual, the first object which he ought to look at was the amount of his income; and that having taken an account of his income, he was bound to cut down his expenditure to meet his income; but the case was quite different when you came to deal with a country. Here you were bound to look first at what the necessity of the public service required, and then to meet these necessities; that if you had a superfluous income, you were not bound to spend one sixpence more than was necessary; and if, on the other hand, there was a deficiency of income, you must still first look at the expenditure which was necessary, and having taken this into consideration, should proceed to consider the best mode of dealing with it. This was the principle stated by the right hon. Gentleman himself before the Finance Committee. In reply to a question, he said that he objected to dealing with the question of income until he had determined upon that of expenditure, But now the right hon. Gentleman, being on the Opposition side of the House, inverted his position, and called upon the Chancellor of the Exchequer for his estimates of income long before the amount of expenditure could possibly be determined. Even when his noble Friend did bring forward his early financial statement, he expressed the difficulty he had in giving any thing like an accurate calculation—a calculation upon which the House could rely; and certainly this difficulty would be much greater now than it was then. The right hon. Gentleman had alluded to some of the difficulties which had obscured the prospects of the commercial world for some time past; had these prospects entirely cleared up? Did not the right hon. Gentleman himself know that it was the prospects of commerce at the opening of the spring trade, upon which Government must, in great measure, found its views as regarded the Customs and Excise? With respect to the probable revenue of the Post-office, he could assure the House that nothing but a sense of public duty would induce him to withhold any information from the House; but from a sense of what was due to the public service, he must decline to accede to the right hon. Gentleman's request on this point, on the present occasion, and, as he considered it his duty not to put on paper any answer to the right hon. Gentleman on this point, he should also take care not to be led by the right hon. Gentleman's seductions to give him the information in any other way, by entering into any argument upon the subject. [Hear, hear, from the Opposition.] Those cheers convinced him that it was not entirely without intention that those lures had been held out, and that even if hon. Gentlemen opposite were not convinced that they should embarrass Government by demanding these returns, the right hon. Gentleman thought he might practise on the new Chancellor of the Exchequer, and obtain that information in the course of his speech which he, perhaps, would not obtain otherwise, but which he wanted to possess, that he might use it for his own purposes. In what he now said, he knew very well that he was exposing himself to numerous attacks from the other side; he could see this in the smiles of the hon. Gentlemen who sat there; he knew that he had so far placed himself at a disadvantage, but he knew also that it was his duty not to be led into any such discussion; and while he felt that he was fulfilling that duty, he was altogether care- less what present advantage might be taken against him by hon. Gentlemen opposite. The information respecting the Post-office would be laid on the Table of the House in the returns which he himself had moved for; and until these were before the House, the calculations of the right hon. Gentleman could have little weight. With regard to the early introduction of the universal low rate of postage, he had felt it to be his duty as Finance Minister, to place the Post-office question, at the earliest possible period, in such a position that Parliament might have some months' experience of the working of the measure before he laid the financial statement of the year before them. There were plenty of reasons why he should and might have postponed the introduction of the low rate; he admitted that many of these reasons were strong and cogent, and he admitted, that it was objectionable to introduce the change in an imperfect state, at a time when the change involved inconvenience to the public service, and partial inconvenience to the public at large; but he had so strongly felt that it was his duty not to evade the question, and he had so decidedly felt it to be expedient that there should be some months' experience of the new system before the House came to consider the financial statement, that despite the obloquy to which he was subjected in various quarters, he had deemed it his imperative duty to introduce the change when and as he had done, even though he admitted it to have been in an incomplete state. He mentioned this to show that, at any rate, in this respect there had been no attempt on the part of Government to evade the question of deficiency of revenue. It was quite impossible for any man, at the present moment, to come to any fixed and fair estimate of what the result of that experiment would be. The course of the right hon. Gentleman was one which had never been pursued before, and one which was quite contrary to the principles on which public income and public expenditure ought to be balanced, not to mention the peculiar difficulties presented by the present state of the mercantile interest. Indeed, he could not understand in what mode the right hon. Gentleman would wish his estimates to be framed. He knew on what principles a Chancellor of the Exchequer came down to the House with his financial statement. He considered what he, on his own responsibility, should state to the House as to the extent to which the House might fairly go, and was responsible, not for the accuracy of particular figures, but for not overstating the amount of income. The right hon. Gentleman had further alluded to the course taken by Government respecting the general debt of the country; to the statement of Lord Melbourne; had praised the Government of which he formed a part; had alluded especially to the right hon. Gentleman near him, and thrown out some observations as to the course which had been pursued by former Whig Administrations. He was quite ready to admit that the right hon. Gentleman opposite had had it in his power to reduce the debt, and that he had availed himself of that power; and much of the reduction he had effected by converting permanent debt into terminable annuities. He would call the attention of the House to what had really been the course pursued—to what had been the increase and diminution of the debt under the administration which followed that of the right hon. Gentleman. On the 5th January, 1831, the amount of funded capital was 757,486,997l.; on the 5th January, 1839, the amount was 761,347,690l., showing an increase of the funded debt of 3,860,693l.; on the 5th January, 1831, the amount of capital unfunded was 27,271,656; on the 5th January, 1839, 24,655,300l., showing a decrease of 2,616,350l., and showing together a total increase on capital debt of 1,244,343l. Thus stood the course of the Whig Government, which had difficulties to deal with which no former Government had had to sustain. There was an addition, under their administration, of not less than twenty millions to the public debt, and this effected not by any financial arrangements of the Ministry—nor by any of the mismanagement of which the right hon. Gentleman talked so much, but added for the purpose of freeing our fellow-subjects from slavery. He had not the slightest objection to taking the responsibility of this addition on his shoulders, together with the office to which he had succeeded. And when the right hon. Gentleman insisted upon his assuming the responsibility of all that had been done by his predecessors in office, since the time of the right hon. Gentleman, all he had to ask in return was that the right hon. Gentleman, acting on the same principle, should take on his own shoulders all the national debt which he found when he entered upon office. But let it not be forgotten that, notwithstanding this very serious addition of 20,000,000l. on account of compensation claims, there was, on the 5th of January, 1839, an increase on the capital debt of only 1,244,343l.; and if the 20,000,000l. additional were not taken into the calculation, so far from an increase, there would be a decrease of 18,700,000l. It seemed that he was to be responsible for all that Lord Monteagle had done in three years of difficulty, but he was to assume nothing for what had been done under Lord Spencer. How stood the case in 1836? On the 5th of January, 1836, the amount of funded debt was 758,549,684l. On the 5th of January, 1840, it was 766,547,684l. showing an increase on capital of 7,997,818l. The unfunded debt amounted on the 5th January, 1836, to 29,954,335l. On the 5th January, 1840, it amounted, including the addition of one million, to 21,688,375l., showing a diminution of 8,265,960l. If this decrease of the unfunded debt were compared with the increase of the funded debt, it would appear that upon the whole there was a decrease. So far, therefore, from having increased the debt, it appeared that his noble Friend (Lord Monteagle) had during his financial career diminished the total amount of the funded and unfunded debt. A Government was usually liable to attack on the ground of expenditure. Upon that ground he had not to complain of hon. Gentlemen opposite. For if an increased income had been pressed upon the Government, it was probably more owing to hon. Gentlemen opposite than to any other cause. The Government had not been encumbered in their estimates by the hon. Gentlemen at the other side attempting to reduce them, because it was admitted that the service of the country could not be carried on with a less expenditure than the Government proposed. Such being the case, the Government not being urged to economy by the Opposition, but rather the reverse, he would compare the army, ordnance, navy, and miscellaneous estimates for the years 1828, 1829, and 1830, three years of an administration which no one would blame for extravagance, but which had received the praise generally of having attended to economy, with the average of the estimates for the same services during nine years of Whig Government. The average estimate for the army, navy, ordnance, and miscellaneous services for the years 1828, 1829, 1830, was 17,350,871l., whilst the average for nine years of Whig Government, from 1831 to 1839, inclusive of Canada grants, was 15,461,688l. If the Gentlemen opposite attacked Lord Mont-eagle's administration alone, the average during the time he was Chancellor of the Exchequer was 15,372,216l., or nearly two millions below the average of the grants in 1828, 1829, 1830. Even during the last year, of which the information could be obtained, including the additional million on account of Canada, the amount was 17,219,692l., which was still below the average of the Government of the right hon. Gentlemen opposite. It might be said, that these estimates came under the observation of Parliament, and therefore that Parliament had contributed to the reductions. But was this the only respect in which, during nine years of Whig Government, attention had been paid to the expenditure of the country? He was not going into details of particular reductions in this office or that office, but would content himself with one great point, namely, the difference between the amount of revenue actually received and the amount paid into the Exchequer. In the last year before the Whigs came into office, he found that the difference between the amount collected and the amount paid into the Exchequer, without taking into account drawbacks, was 4,875,000l. and odd. He found that in 1839, the last year of which the account could be got, the difference amounted to only 4,042,000l., showing a reduction of 833,000l. in a sum under five millions. There might be one other point, but the right hon. Gentleman had relieved him from the necessity of touching upon it—he meant the prospects of the country. The right hon. Gentleman, in whose views he concurred, had stated that there was a temporary depression arising from temporary causes but that he looked to the prospects of the country with sanguine expectation that those difficulties would be only temporary, and that none of its real resources were touched. The state of the Customs and Excise was the best criterion of the state of the country, and it appeared that in 1830 they amounted together to 36,184,000l., and in 1839, to 35,919,000l., showing little alteration, without taking into consideration the reductions made during that period. When he looked to the produce of the revenue he found that it kept up in a remarkable manner, and when he remembered the reductions of taxation during that period, which it would be very difficult actually to estimate, but which were upwards of six millions, he could not but consider it as a conclusive proof that the resources of the country-were uninjured. During that period there had been not only the reduction of six millions of taxation, but the public had been enabled to bear the additional burden of the twenty millions for the emancipation of the negroes, and the interest upon it of about 750,000l. a-year. With regard to the Post-office, it was unnecessary to fight over again the battle which they had fought in the last session of Parliament. But he would state the ground on which the measure was carried. He never concealed from the House or the public that it was not an ordinary revenue transaction. It was a case in which great and important grounds alone justified the experiment. What were those grounds? Was it not admitted on all hands that the reduction of postage would be one of the greatest blessings that could be communicated to the public at large, with regard to commercial interests, to domestic and social purposes—to friendly intercourse—to the advancement of literature and science, and even to religious communications? The clergy had been among the most anxious promoters of the scheme, and from the clergy more perhaps than from any other class, had he received acknowledgments of its being a benefit of the utmost importance. This was not all. Was not that a most appalling fact, which appeared before the committee, that from one end of the country to the other, with every class, and under all circumstances, there was a conspiracy to cheat the revenue? Was it then a mere revenue question? Was it not a question well worth consideration, whether, by taking away a portion of revenue, they could give those great benefits to the country which he sincerely believed would follow from the measure, and could also remove the great calamity to which he had referred; for he could conceive nothing worse than that a whole people should be united to break the law. The right hon. Gentleman had been extremely facetious upon the subject of the resolutions moved by his noble Friend (Lord Mouteagle) last year. He would not conceal his opinion, but would state frankly what he considered to be the effect of those resolutions. He thought his noble Friend was perfectly justified when he took upon himself, as a finance minister, to bring forward the measure of reduction—in bringing, at the same time, in the most solemn and distinct manner, under the cognizance of Parliament and of the country, the alternative which possibly or probably would arise from the adoption of that measure. He did not think a finance minister would have been justified, when he saw that a defalcation in the revenue might be the consequence of his proposal, in not declaring that if such should be the event, a new tax must be imposed. A minister, in such a situation, was bound to bring forward, in the most open manner, the alternative, in case of defalcation, and then ask whether Parliament would, on such terms, consent to the reduction. He believed the public ought to be consulted as to the mode in which money was to be taken out of their pockets. He believed they were the best judges of the mode, and if they were of opinion that the Post-office tax was exorbitant, and pressed upon their comfort, the interest of their commerce, their social intercourse, they were perfectly justified in desiring to have it altered. He believed, that throughout the country the people would be prepared, in preference to suffering the re-establishment of the Post-office rates, to make an equivalent. So far he concurred in the course of his noble Friend. But he was perfectly certain that neither the words of the resolutions, nor of the Act of Parliament, introduced any new duty to that House, or created any new obligation. It was the duty of the House to furnish for the public service what was absolutely necessary to keep faith with the public creditor, to give to the establishments of the country sufficient force to protect its commerce, and to keep up the national honour; but beyond this the duty of Parliament did not go. If, unfortunately, it should turn out that without resolutions or Acts of Parliament the House or the country was so lost to all those feelings as to be willing to see the public service starve, and the public establishments sink to such a condition that neither the honour of the country abroad, nor of commerce, could be defended,—or to be willing to break faith with the public creditor, then he believed that such a pledge as that given by both Houses of Parliament last year would be of no force, and would deserve to have no confidence placed in it. But he had better expectations. His noble Friend in the other House, and his noble Friend in that House, had stated, without any of the subterfuge or systematic evasion of which they were accused, the course they would pursue. For himself, so long as he held the office which it was now his fortune to hold, he should not shrink from the task, however unpopular it might be, of calling on the House to redeem what he considered it was bound to redeem, and to provide for what was required for the public service.

Mr. Goulburn

said his right hon. Friend, who opened the subject had so fully and completely stated the grounds on which the question rested, and the right hon. Gentleman opposite had offered so little opposition to it, that he (Mr. Goulburn) felt great difficulty in doing more than replying to a few minor topics which the right hon. Gentleman seemed to consider a sufficient answer to the motion before the House. The right hon. Gentleman indeed concluded his speech by professions, by adhering to which he would receive the praise of every Member of Parliament. He told them in high sounding language of the obligations imposed on them to keep up an equality of revenue and expenditure—to furnish what might be necessary to maintain the establishments of the country—to uphold its public credit and keep the national honour respected both at home and abroad. In that he cordially concurred. That was the principle he had for years endeavoured to impress on the Government. He rejoiced to find, that at the opening of the right hon. Gentleman's financial career he had avowed himself prepared to act on principles which every honest man in the country must approve. But the right hon. Gentleman further told them, that if the House did not concur in those opinions it would be lost to every sense of proper duty. He must take leave, however, to say it was not on the House alone that the maintenance of these principles depended. If the Government, having as they ought and must have, the lead in the two Houses of Parliament, manfully adhered to those principles, he entertained no fear with respect to the House of Commons. But, if commencing a financial career with high-sounding principles, the justice of which no man could deny, they should afterwards be found departing from those principles until the revenue could not maintain the establishments of the country, the House would be placed in the double difficulty of having not only to act on their sense of duty, but to fight against the resistance and misconduct of the Government. If he did not yield absolute credit to the assertions of the right hon. Gentleman upon the present occasion, he thought he had good reasons for expressing his doubt. He well remembered that the late Chancellor of the Exchequer, when he entered on the administration of financial affairs, made professions exactly corresponding with those which had been repeated to-night. He told them how important it was to avoid a deficiency in the revenue; how indispensable it was to maintain a surplus; and that when the surplus was limited, they could not afford to repeal any tax and yet what was the result of those high-sounding declarations? Before he left the office the right hon. Gentleman had abandoned every one of them. Instead of maintaining a surplus, he had for years a large deficiency; he consented to repeal taxes, not on a small surplus, but in the face of an enormous deficiency, and left the finances of the country in such a situation, that in the opinion of the Government there was no alternative but to impose a new tax to meet the deficiency. On the 14th of August, 1835, being the period of the year when he generally thought fit to favour them with his financial exposition, the Chancellor of the Exchequer made these observations: Let the House not assume that it will be competent for me to propose any remission of taxation. Would to God it were so. I can assure hon. Gentlemen that there is no portion of the duties of a Chancellor of the Exchequer that can be so agreeable to his feelings as proposing the repeal of an unpopular tax; and, if Ministers find themselves bound to resist the applications that are made from time to time, then Gentlemen must do us the justice to believe, that we are led to do so most reluctantly, and that it can only be from a sense of duty, that we make a stern and determined stand against the remission or reduction of taxation; and that it is only done when such reduction or remission is likely to be attended with danger to the permanent interests of the country. Then, in answer to the hon. Member for Kilkenny, who suggested, that a portion of the duty on tobacco should be remitted, and that the revenue would be increased, the right hon. Gentleman went on to say, There is no experiment I should make with more pleasure, than the experiment of reducing taxation for the purpose of increasing consumption. But I dare not make such an experiment at the hazard of shaking the credit of the country. When we have a bonâ fide surplus to deal with, then it may be right so to apply it; but we ought not to venture on such reductions, if by making them we place at risk too large a proportion of the public revenue. The amount then proposed to be sacrificed was 300,000l. Such, then, was the declaration of the Chancellor of the Exchequer annually repeated about the same period in 1836, 1837, and 1838, and what was the result? That in 1839, in the face of a deficiency of revenue above 1,000,000l., he proposed the remission of taxes, not to the amount of 300,000l., but to affect a branch of revenue producing 1,600,000l. Why the right hon. Gentleman should resist the motion of his right hon. Friend, he was completely at a loss to understand. In the first place, the right hon. Gentleman said, "can you expect that I can lay before you an estimate of the income of the country at this season of the year? First ascertain the expenditure, and then settle the income necessary to meet it." But the papers moved for by his right hon. Friend would not interfere with that. They did require as in former times, on the winding up of the whole financial concerns, to know in the first place the necessary expenditure of the country, and then the produce from which the whole revenue was to arise. But the motion of his right hon. Friend did not require an estimate of the whole revenue of the country; the estimate he moved for was an estimate of the produce of the consolidated fund. The right hon. Gentleman had told the House, that his means were deficient by 2,000,000l. a year, and wished them to believe, that he could not give an estimate of the amount of the consolidated fund without an estimate of the whole finances of the year. But this observation did not apply to the consolidated fund. The consolidated fund was charged with various payments, the discharge of which was essential to the credit and confidence of the country. They knew that there was a great deficiency in various branches of the revenue, and he and his Friends wished to see how far the consolidated fund, after providing for these payments, was capable of supplying a surplus towards the expenditure of the year. There was one circumstance which rendered it the more proper that the House should have an estimate of the consolidated fund. When Lord Monteagle last year came down to the House, almost at the last hour of the Session, and proposed a loan of 4,000,000l. for funding certain Exchequer bills, he was asked in the House, "How do you intend to provide for the interest of the loan? You tell us there is a deficiency in this year's account, and we want to know how the loan is to be provided for." The answer of Lord Monteagle was, "I have a bill to introduce with respect to the Bank of Ireland, which will produce to the country 85,000l. a-year, which will go towards paying the interest of the loan." That bill had been thrown out—no, he would not say it was thrown out, like other measures of the Government, it had been abandoned, and consequently Lord Monteagle was deprived of that resource which he expected from the introduction of the bill for the regulation of the Bank of Ireland. How, then, was the consolidated fund, without this aid proposed to be given to it, likely to satisfy the claims upon it? He should like to know why her Majesty's Ministers withheld this information; whether, in the peculiar circumstances of the present time, his right hon. Friend had not a right to call for the account, in order to show how far the consolidated fund was in a condition to meet the necessary claims which the law had imposed upon it. "But," said the right hon Gentleman, "you have no precedent—can you point out to us a single one? The motion is entirely unprecedented." He wished to understand from the right hon. Gentleman, at his pleasure, whether he really meant to ground his opposition to the motion upon the absence of precedent? for if he rested it on that, and it only rested with him (Mr. Goulbourn) to point out a precedent, if he could not convince him that so far from there being no precedent, there were many, he should not trouble the House further, He should not trouble the right hon. Gentleman with many precedents; he should mention only one or two that were most applicable, and he should not have adverted to this point at all if the right hon. Gentleman had not said there was no precedent; for even if there had been no precedent for such a motion, the present circumstances would make a precedent. But if the right hon. Gentleman relied upon the wisdom of our ancestors (an argument not often urged by the other side), he should state what the wisdom of our ancestors had been on this head. In 1803, at the close of a war, and when our finances were in some difficulty, it was proposed to bring in a bill to make a considerable alteration in the Custom laws, which would affect the produce of different duties levied under the old law, and in the discussion upon that measure, a question arose how far the alteration in the laws might affect the permanent interests of the country, and an account was moved for on the 15th of June, 1803, of the reduction in the amount of the consolidated fund, in consequence of the bill for consolidating the duties of customs. It was said that the House had a right to call for a specific account of the computed addition to, or reduction of, the consolidated fund from the alteration of taxation which had taken place, and it was acquiesced in by the Government, and whatever was the object of the motion, it was agreed to without hesitation. But perhaps the right hon. Gentleman would say there was no precedent at at a later period. He would go, then, to 1823. The right hon. Gentleman had said, that Lord Ripon only gave loose statements to the House, and that he objected to tell the House how we stood at the time of the spring trade, and required it to wait till the autumn trade. What was the fact? Lord Ripon made an alteration of a tax in 1823, and in the discussion on the subject, a question arose how far it would affect the consolidated fund, and a motion was made (the right hon. Gentleman would tell him by some active Member of the Opposition) to the following effect; and it was nearly at the present date, for it was on the 7th of March, 1823—at an early period of the year, when all the difficulties of the spring trade were in full operation. The motion was— That there be laid before the House an estimate of the probable future increase of the consolidated fund, after allowing for the probable loss by reason of taxes reduced, and of the future annual charge for the same. So that this was exactly what the motion of his right hon. Friend called for. Therefore, if they were to be governed by precedent, the precedents were in favour of the motion, and in the existing circumstances of the country, the motion now made was more particularly called for, inasmuch as the present circumstances of the country, above all others, rendered it necessary for the House to have a knowledge of the state of the consolidated fund. But the question did not rest upon precedent. The question for the House to decide was, whether or not it was consistent with their duty to their constituents that they should be put in possession of a general estimate of the produce of the consolidated fund, with a view of making up their minds as to the present state of our resources, and the means of placing the finances of the country on a safe and respectable footing. He said, that, on the reason of the thing, the motion of his right hon. Friend ought to be conceded. It was admitted on all hands that we were in a state which, to use an expression of the noble Lord at the head of the Treasury, was "extremely disagreeable," which meant, he presumed, if translated into less polished language, a state of considerable difficulty and danger. If, then, that was our condition, he asked any man whether it was not most advisable, in the present circumstances of the country, to let the House and the country know the exact condition we were in? The motion was not made to inculpate the Government, but to enable the country to know its real situation. He had no fear of the resources of the country, or of the readiness of the people to meet any difficulty in which they might be placed; but the Government must place confidence in them, and not refuse to lay before them at the proper period the state of our financial affairs. The right hon. Gentleman had told the House that during the period between 1835 and the present moment, there had been no reduction of the debt; that the debt of 1835 and 1839 was, with the funded and unfunded debt together, nearly on a par, and yet he took credit for the present administration for leaving the funded and unfunded debt as they found it. But he must say that it was not satisfactory to his mind, nor could it be to that of any man who contemplated the future interests of the country, to find, that during four years of continued peace, no progress had been made in the reduction of the debt of the country; and still less satisfactory would it be to the country to know that whilst no progress had been made in the reduction of the capital of the debt, funded and unfunded together, there had been an increase in the amount of charge on the debt, amounting to nearly a million of money: for if the House looked to the charge of the debt in 1835, and compared it with the charge in the year ending 1840, they would find an augmentation of charge of the funded and unfunded debt from 28,700,000l. to 29,450,000l., being an increase of 700,000l. in the amount of the charge for the debt. If the charge was increasing, how could they prevent the capital of the debt from increasing? The right hon. Gentleman had, indeed, stood up in defence of the whole of the Whig Administrations from 1831. He said they could not make any large reduction of the debt, since it was necessary to provide for the compensation in order to give effect to the abolition of negro slavery. He agreed with the right hon. Gentleman that that would have been an addition to the debt of the country, and this was one of the strongest reasons why he enforced upon. the Government the necessity of directing all its efforts to the reduction of the debt, because, govern the country as you will, occasions would occur for great sacrifices, and if we raised loans, and added to the debt, and provided no means for reducing the debt, we should be sapping the foundations of national prosperity. The right hon. Gentleman had compared the present Administration with that of the Duke of Wellington; he said that the Duke of Wellington had not 20,000,000l. to provide for the redemption of negro slavery. He knew it; but see what the Duke of Wellington did towards the reduction of the debt. In 1828, the amount of the debt was 777,000,000l.; in 1831, it was 75 7,000,000l. so that there was a reduction of 20,000,000l. of debt in three years, and if the Duke of Wellington had been called upon to advance 20,000,000l. for the redemption of negro slavery, he would have done it without adding one sixpence to the national debt, because he adhered to the sound principle of reducing the present debt of the country, to prepare for any exigency that might arise. He could not enter into any details of the expenditure of the country during the period to which the right hon. Gentleman had referred; but, with reference to the efforts made by the Duke of Wellington to reduce the expense of collection of the revenue, he should read a statement made by the predecessor of the right hon. Gentleman (Lord Monteagle) in 1835, and leave the House to decide whether or not the Duke of Wellington's Administration had reduced the expenditure of the country. Mr. S. Rice said, on the 14th of August, 1835— It must be clear to every hon. Gentleman who hears me, that every reduction heretofore made renders it more and more difficult to carry the principle of reduction further. On this account, acknowledging, as I have always done, with readiness and pleasure, the great reductions made by the Administration of the Duke of Wellington, the difficulty of effecting further reductions being increased, the merit (if I may venture to say so, and I do not know why I should not speak the truth) of those who carry reductions further is increased in proportion. It was not his intention to deny that the right hon. Gentleman opposite had proceeded on the precedent thus furnished them with reference to the reduction of the revenue, but he had the authority of Lord Monteagle for saying that the reductions effected by preceding administrations had made it difficult for him to carry reduction further. He would not dwell longer on this question of expenditure, except by adverting for one moment to the alteration made in the Post-office department. The right hon. Gentleman said, that that alteration had conferred great benefit on society; that it had broken up the great conspiracy which had previously existed to defraud the revenue; and that it was to be regarded not merely as an affair of finance, but as a measure advantageous to public morality. The right hon. Gentleman should recollect that those who sat on the opposition side of the House never denied that there might be benefits arising from the reduction of the rates of postage, which would make any proposition of that nature deserving of consideration; but they maintained, that if such a measure were of importance to the morality of society, still no proposal for the removal of a tax ought to be made unless accompanied with an explanation as to the mode in which it might be proposed to keep up the revenue. The right hon. Gentleman said, that in consenting to the reduction of the postage the Government was aware that there might probably be a deficiency in the revenue. It was not, however, a question of probability; if it had been, there might have been some, though a poor, excuse for the Government contenting itself with a pledge that the deficiency should be made up. But what was the position of the country when this reduction was proposed? There was an acknowledged deficiency continuing from year to year, which had to be made up. The Government did not dare to face it, and yet for the sake of a little popularity they had endangered the whole of the finances of the country. With respect to the motion now before the House, he had shown, that so far as precedent was concerned, they had the example of two successive administrations, by which similar returns had been, without the slightest dissent, granted; and if the papers were now refused, the country would conclude that the object of the present Government was to conceal the real state of the finances. The course taken by the right hon. Gentlemen opposite might appear to them a conscientious one, yet every Member of that House, desirous of applying his mind to the best mode of removing the evils under which the country laboured, must give his vote in favour of a motion, the object of which was to lay before the country, in a clear view, one great branch of the national income.

Mr. Hume

complained that those who, on both sides, had taken part in the present debate, had wandered away from the real object of the motion. In his opinion the country ought to be obliged to any man, who brought before it the state of its revenues, or who endeavoured to keep down the expenditure, so that it should not be beyond the means of the country to meet it. Hitherto they had been afraid to look the difficulties of the country in the face; but they ought at least to be prepared to encounter them. They had to recollect that there was a deficiency of six millions in three years, and that, to add to their embarrassments, they were bound to consider what had occurred in China. A large portion of the Irish nation had left off drinking whiskey, so that there was on that to be expected a deficiency of half a million in the year. He had seen an account of ten thousand persons in the town of Kilkenny having ceased from drinking whiskey, and he understood that ten thousand more in the county had pledged themselves to Father Mathew not to taste whiskey. If the pledge was kept, as he believed it would be in Ireland, then there would certainly be a deficiency to the amount he had stated. As to the Post-office, he had never concealed from himself or others, that there must be a deficiency under that head. But then, if there was any one measure of the Government which entitled them to his honest and sincere support, it was their carrying that measure; and he did not think that hon. Gentlemen opposite forwarded their own cause much by upbraiding the Government for carrying that measure. When they saw what had happened connected with the China trade—what must occur from the cessation of the use of spirits, and what had been done with regard to the Post-office, they knew that there could not be an increase, but a deficiency in their resources, and therefore they ought fairly to look at all the difficulties which they had to encounter. He was not one who felt any distrust in the resources of the country. He found the revenue was better than it had been. In 1833, it was 46,000,000l.; in 1836, which was an extraordinary instance, and not to be taken, therefore, into the account, it was 48,000,000l.; and last year it was 47,000,000l. The revenue, therefore, had kept up, in spite of every disadvantage. He had always endeavoured to reduce the expenditure of the country, while hon. Gentlemen opposite recommended every species of extravagance, and supported every Government in it. [An hon. Member—"Not in voting 20,000l. less for Prince Albert."] He admitted that; but he would have given them some credit for sincerity and principle if they had voted with himself for reducing it to 21,000l. He had, failing in his own motion, voted for 30,000l. rather than 50,000l.; but he should have preferred 21,000l. to either. He could not get hon. Gentlemen opposite to vote with him for reducing the estimates. They voted against him, too, on the Canada question, and that would cost them no less than 5,000,000l. of money. Now, who were to blame for that? Hon. Gentlemen opposite might fancy that they could throw the burden off their own shoulders, but he assured them they could not do so. Mr. Poulett Thomson was now offering terms to the Canadians, which they had sought for, and which the noble Lord on his side of the House refused, and that hon. Gentlemen on the opposite side had refused also. He made no distinction between the two parties—they were guilty with respect to Canada on both sides of the House. He kept himself out of all blame on account of the Canadian question. There was, he insisted, no want of resources in the country. All their difficulties were to be ascribed to the extravagance of that House. As to their having a surplus, he must say, from his experience, that when he found a Chancellor of the Exchequer having much money to spare, he was always extravagant, and therefore, he was not at all sorry when he found a little difficulty in the finances of the country. He had always endeavoured to reduce the expenditure, and to maintain the public credit of the country, as he believed that no greater calamity could befall the country than that the revenue should in any way be injuriously affected. The right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Goulburn) had said, that there had been no evasion equal to the present on the part of any Government, Did the right hon. Gentleman recollect the battle which he himself had waged with him on the Dead Weight Bill? That right hon. Gentleman and his party then played one of the greatest tricks he knew of, and by which they raised 11,000,000l. by deferred annuities of 585,000l. a year for forty years, which the country was paying at this day, and all this with the idea of pro- viding for the Dead Weight; and the Dead Weight was heavier this year than it was then. They ought not to talk of 40,000,000l. of taxation, and 8,000,000l. reduction, unless they had materials upon which to form a judgment. If they wished to have a discussion which should raise the question of the reduction of taxation, and which should show the manner in which the revenue had risen under every reduction, and that, in proportion as they took off 1,000,000l., instead of losing that amount, they had only lost 200,000l., and scarcely as much on many occasions, he would be prepared to meet it. He was an advocate for the reduction of heavy taxes, because he believed such reduction, without lessening the revenue, added to the comforts of the people. He must say, that the discussion, as far as these matters were concerned, had nothing to do with the question; and he would therefore come to the question before the House. He admitted he had deviated, but it was in order to notice what had fallen from the right hon. Gentlemen opposite. With regard to the question itself, it was somewhat curious that the right hon. Gentleman should have interfered with a question which he had for twenty years been in the habit of bringing forward. He was disappointed that the right hon. Gentleman had not made some acknowledgment. The right hon. Gentleman, on the contrary, claimed merit for the novelty of this motion, when the right hon. Gentleman must have known that the first thing he did on the first night of Supply was to say, "Do not vote money till it is shown what revenue you have to provide." The answer of the right hon. Gentleman opposite was, "I care not what the income is, we must have such establishments as we consider necessary for the protection and glory of the country; and having taken the sense of the House upon that question, we will provide the means." Had he not always resisted such a doctrine? He was told that he must not look to money or means—that if the Government wanted more ships, or men, or money, to support or increase a Church Establishment, they roust first determine upon this, and then find the means. That was a course he had always opposed. His proposition was, that whenever they brought forward the estimates, they should state, in round numbers, what they called for, and how they provided for it. That ought to have taken place on the first day they voted a supply, and on this ground he had again and again drawn the attention of the House, to this subject. He must tell the noble Lord the Secretary of the Colonies, and the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that he was surprised at their resisting this motion. If he could give them advice, he would say by all means give this paper. Was it anything extraordinary that was asked for? If the right hon. the Chancellor of the Exchequer would send for the heads of the excise, customs, and stamps, he would in a few days be prepared to give the information required. They had only to consider in what main heads of revenue there was likely to be any deficiency. This information he thought it but fair that the House should be put in possession of. It might be said that this was a factious motion. He would say, defeat it by agreeing to it. He would still farther say, "do not allow that to be factious which is reasonable." He begged the noble Lord not to appear to refuse information which was really reasonable, and which ought to be before the House. It gave the impression as if it was wished to conceal something. A similar return had certainly before now been refused when he moved for it, but when it suited the purpose of the Government, they produced it. It might have been refused to him on the ground that he would make a bad use of it, by moving for reductions of taxation, and he must say, he had often been refused this return by Gentlemen opposite. He had hoped better things of those who now sat on the Treasury benches. He had hoped that they would go on improving, and he did not wish to be particularly disagreeable, and therefore he had not been perhaps quite so attentive to this portion of his duty as formerly. This, however, did not rescue the Gentlemen opposite from the guilt of having refused this same return. The present state of the country, and the facts stated by the right hon. Gentleman opposite, in his opinion, particularly warranted the production of this return, and with this opinion, if the question went to a division, he would support the motion.

Mr. Labouchere

would not enter into the side field of discussion opened by hon. Gentlemen opposite, but would confine himself to the simple point before the House. The point the House had to decide was very plain and simple, and he was anxious to call back the attention of the House to it. The question was, whether they would impose a condition on the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the management of the financial affairs of the country, such as the House had never consented to impose on any of his predecessors. He did say, notwithstanding the precedents quoted by the right hon. Gentleman opposite, that if the House consented to support him in that part of his motion which alone was objected to by the Government, they would adopt a course which no House of Commons had ever before adopted towards a Chancellor of the Exchequer. It was perfectly true, as the right hon. Gentleman had said, that there had been occasions on which the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for the time being, consented to produce the information which the right hon. Gentleman demanded. But he begged the House to remark, the material distinction between the state of things at the time of the precedents quoted, and those of the present moment. It was admitted that, on those occasions, the Government was a consenting party to the production, and that those who were charged with the financial affairs of the country saw no inconvenience in the production. But at present his right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer stated, that whatever difficulties might embarrass his course, and he had not attempted to diminish them, but had announced his intentions fairly and manfully to encounter them, these difficulties would be aggravated if the House consented to this motion. There was an essential distinction. In the case of Lords Ripon and Spencer, although the budget had not been formally brought forward before the required information was given, yet a very important part of the financial statement had been developed, and they had even been able to go so far as to propose a remission of taxation. Was it fair, then, to represent these two instances as parallel cases to the present? In a very important particular, so far from being similar cases, they were directly opposed. His right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, had admitted, that in the condition of our commercial and financial affairs, there were many circumstances which made it a difficult task to give an estimate of this description. His right hon. Friend had not yet proposed or even intimated, what measures he should feel it his duty to propose to meet the financial difficulties of the country, whatever they might be. He asked the House, whether any Parliamentary grounds had been stated, whether any valid reason had been assigned, why this novel and indeed unprecedented course should be taken of forcing a Chancellor of the Exchequer into a course which had never been imposed upon his predecessors. The right hon. Gentleman opposite seemed to feel that there was a particularly strong argument against his motion on the score of novelty, for he stated that if he proposed an extraordinary course, the truth was, they were placed in extraordinary circumstances. He did not find that there was any great difference of opinion with regard to the financial condition of the country, but it was generally admitted that the financial condition of the country was calculated to excite any thing but despondency or alarm either in that house or with the public, while at the same time it was admitted that there was a deficiency, an accumulating deficiency, which it was the duty of the House and the Government to look in the face, and adopt such measures as were necesary. The case would be materially altered if the Government, in the course of the session, had endeavoured to conceal from the House the situation of the country; but the right hon. Gentleman himself had admitted that the Prime Minister and the noble Lord, the Secretary for the Colonies, had volunteered a statement, that they considered the financial condition of the country was deserving of the attention of that House and of Government. He therefore really did not see upon what it was that the right hon. Gentleman rested his case in asking the House to assent to this part of the proposal. He begged the House to remember that there was but one part of the return objected to. He did not know that it was necessary for him to trouble the House at greater length. He had felt desirous to call the attention of the House to the only point in dispute, and which he felt it his duty to oppose as being unfair and wholly unprecedented.

Sir G. Clerk

almost felt it necessary to apologise to the House for venturing to address them after the able speeches of his right hon. Friend who brought the motion forward, and his right hon. Friend the Member for the University of Cambridge, to which hitherto no answer had been given. The President of the Board of Trade, at the commencement of his address, remarked, that many persons had come into the House since the commencement of the debate. He appealed to those who had not the benefit of hearing the previous speeches, whether they had heard from the lips of the President of the Board of Trade, one single reason for refusing the motion. That right hon. Gentleman founded his argument on want of precedent, and stated, that similar demands had been successfully resisted, although his right hon. Friend had quoted precedents where former Governments did not object to lay before the House estimates of the income of the country for a future year. But even for a moment supposing there was no precedent, were not the circumstances of the country, with respect to its finances, so unprecedented as to demand a departure from the customary course? The hon. Member for Kilkenny had said, that when he sat on the Opposition side of the House, he had frequently made a similar demand to the then Government, and it had been refused. Probably, that was because the Chancellor of the Exchequer was about, in the course of a few days, to make his financial statement. He rather thought that was the case; but, be it as it might, he would now state to the House the reasons assigned by a Tory Chancellor of the Exchequer, in an unreformed Parliament, for assenting to that which a Whig Chancellor of the Exchequer in a reformed House of Commons thought proper to refuse. On the 23rd of February, 1824, within three weeks after the meeting of Parliament, Lord Ripon said, In conformity with the course I adopted in the last Session of Parliament, I take the earliest opportunity of opening to the House, the view which his Majesty's Government take of the present situation, and future prospects of our finances. And he went on to state the reasons why he adopted that course:— In time of war a proceeding of this kind is obviously impracticable, because the various changes and exigencies to which a state of hostility necessarily gives rise, render it impossible that her Majesty's Government should be able, at so early a period, to present to the House of Commons any precise estimate of the supplies, which circumstances may make it imperative on them to require in the course of the year. In time of peace, however, no such difficulty exists. Such a course enables the House to watch with more vigilance and jealousy any proposition which his Majesty's Government may submit to it, and gives it an opportunity of entering into a more attentive and detailed examination of all these branches of income and expenditure, in the regulation of which the interests of the country are so deeply involved."^* If these reasons operated when Lord Ripon was at the head of the financial affairs of the country, he was quite at a loss to know what reasons the Chancellor of the Exchequer could now have for acting in a contrary manner. No doubt, that right hon. Gentleman said, that the financial year was changed, and that was the only reason he adduced for his refusal of the motion; but he could not conceive why that fact should form a ground for the refusal. The noble Lord at the head of the Government, had admitted in a long debate in the other House, some time since, that the finances of the country were in a state of great difficulty. But how did the noble Lord opposite act now? With 308 Gentlemen behind him to vote confidence in his Government on a late occasion, he would not now reciprocate that confidence by giving them the slightest insight into the probable condition of the country on the subject of finance; he refused to supply them with the means of ascertaining the state of the affairs of the nation for the current year. The noble Lord had, on this occasion, thrown himself on the pity of his opponents, to aid him against those who voted confidence in him so very recently; and after throwing all the obloquy he could then muster on the Tory party, charging them with disloyalty and insult to the Sovereign, he now appealed to them for sympathy and aid—realising almost the expression of Shylock— He would have moneys. If, however, the noble Lord hoped by that appeal to win them to support the imposition of any fresh burdens on the country, he could assure him beforehand that he need look for no countenance from the Conservative side of that House. He agreed with the hon. Member for Kilkenny that the Chancellor of the Exchequer, finding himself unable to offer any argu- ^*Hansard, Vol. x. New Series p. 304. ments against the return moved for by the right hon. Gentleman, endeavoured to divert the attention of the House from the subject by instituting comparisons between the present Government and that in which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Cambridge was at the head of the financial department of the country. The answer of his right hon. Friend, however, was so satisfactory to the House on that subject that it left him nothing to say in addition, more than it left the Chancellor of the Exchequer a bit of ground to stand on. But when the hon. Gentleman proceeded to compare the Government of the Duke of Wellington, in 1829–1830, in the matter of expenditure, to his own Government, he felt called on to say that a fair statement was not made on the subject. The hon. Gentleman chose to go into the question of averages; that suited his purpose, but it was not sufficient for the purposes of truth. In 1827, 1828, and 1829, there was successively a large decrease in the expenditure of the country; since the time Lord Melbourne was in power, in 1837, 1838, and 1839, there had been a large increase in it. In 1834 a reduction of two millions would then have been a fair average, but now there was nearly that much increase. The present Government succeeded that of the right hon. Baronet the Member for Tamworth, in 1835, at a time when all possible reduction had taken place, when salaries were cut down to the lowest figure, and when every expense was curtailed to the utmost possible amount. At that period the expenditure, exclusive of the miscellaneous estimates, was 13,800,000l. In the year 1837, however, that expenditure had increased to 14,392,000l.; in 1838, it had risen to 15,000,000l.; in 1839, to 16,000,000l. in round numbers; while in the probable estimates for the ensuing year, 1840, it was averaged at 17,493,545l. Thus there was an increase on the expenditure in four years, of 3,690,000l. When the profligacy of former Governments was complained of by hon. Members opposite, they would, he hoped, bear in mind those facts. He would next compare the whole expenditure and income of the country under the Duke of Wellington's Government of 1830 with that under the present Administration. In 1830 the net income of the country was 50,560,616l.; in 1840 it was only 47,844,800l., showing a clear diminution of 2,715,816l. In 1830 the expenditure of the country was 47,143,000l.; in 1840 it was 49,357,000l., showing a clear increase of expenditure over income of 2,214,000l. The result being, that instead of a surplus of income above the expenditure, as in 1830, of 3,000,000l., the income was deficient by about a million and a half. As to the change in the Post office revenue department, and the reduction was allowed on all hands to be certain, he (Sir G. Clerk) thought that one of the reasons why the papers moved for should be produced, was, that the House might see the probable effect of that change upon the finances of the country at as early a period as possible. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had argued that no accurate returns could be made from that department for some months, but he could not agree with the right hon. Gentleman in that respect; and he did not know why the right hon. Gentleman should have been so premature in bringing his plan into action before his arrangements were completed, unless he had made a compact with some of his supporters last year. The right hon. President of the Board of Trade had argued that the production of the returns would cause inconvenience to the public service, while the only ground of refusal alleged by the Chancellor of the Exchequer was, that he did not think he would be able to form the estimate required. There certainly was no unity in these objections, and therefore he felt called upon to reject them. There was no proof given in support of the one, and no argument alleged in favour of the other; and he believed the real ground of refusal was the cheerless prospect which their production would hold out for the Government. He believed, however, that, though the appearances were bad, the general resources of the country were not affected, which were now nearly as great as in the year of unexampled prosperity alluded to in the course of the debate. He did not think that any evil would be produced either on the commercial or money-market by a fair and full statement of the probable income and expenditure: he was confident that, on the contrary, it would remove much apprehension which existed in the country as to the loss of revenue, and the great additional expenses to be incurred this year. The right hon. Gentleman had not stated what were the nature of the taxes he was to lay on—whether it would be better that that announcement should be postponed until they knew the result of the great Post-office experiment, or whether it would be better to raise the deficiency, if any, by some fresh taxes, or by reverting to the old system of postage. That must depend upon the general feeling of the country, whether it conceived the former imposition of postage a more onerous burden than having the same amount of tax laid on some more necessary article of consumption.

Mr. Herries

replied. The information he moved for was admitted on all hands to be of the greatest importance to the country, and it was now for the House to decide whether or not it should be required. With respect to what had been urged against his motion, he appealed to the House, and he challenged any hon. Member who heard the debate, to say whether any reasonable objection had been raised to it, whether any allegation of impossibility had been put f:—orth, whether any statement had been made on the part of the Government which should induce him to abstain from pressing the question to a division.

The House divided; Ayes 182; Noes 172: Majority 10.

List of the AYES.
Acland, T. D.	Cole, Lord
A'Court, Captain	Colquhoun, J. C.
Alsager, Captain	Compton, H. C.
Arbuthnott, H.	Conolly, E.
Ashley, Lord	Cooper, E. J.
Attwood, W.	Corry, hon. H.
Attwood, M.	Courtenay, P.
Bagge, W.	Cresswell, C.
Bailey, J.	Darby, G.
Baillie, Colonel	D'Israeli, R.
Baker, E.	Douglas, Sir C. E.
Baring, hon. F.	Duncombe, W.
Baring, H. B.	Duncombe, A.
Barrington, Lord	Du Pre, G.
Bell, M.	East, J. B.
Bentinck, Lord G.	Eastnor, Lord
Blackburne, I.	Eaton, R. J.
Blackstone, W. S.	Egerton, W. E.
Blair, J.	Ellis, J.
Blennerhassett, A.	Fector, J.
Boldero, H. G.	Fellowes, E.
Bolling, W.	Filmer, Sir E.
Bramston, T. W.	Fitzroy, hon. J.
Broadley, H.	Follett, Sir W.
Broadwood, H.	Freshfield, J. W.
Bruce, Lord E.	Gaskell, J. Milnes
Cantilupe, Lord	Gladstone, W. E.
Cholmondeley, hn. H.	Glynne, Sir S. R.
Clive, hon. R. H.	Godson, R.
Cochrane, Sir T.	Gordon, Captain

Gore, O. W.	Neeld, J.
Goring, H. D.	Norreys, Lord
Goulburn, H.	Ossulston, Lord
Graham, Sir J.	Owen, Sir J.
Granby, Marquis	Packe, C. W.
Grant, F. W.	Palmer, G.
Grimsditch, T.	Parker, R. T.
Grimston, Lord	Peel, Sir R.
Grote, G.	Perceval, Colonel
Hale, H. B.	Pigot, B.
Halford, H.	Planta, J.
Hamilton, Lord C.	Polhill, F.
Harcourt, G. G.	Pollock, Sir F.
Harcourt, G. S.	Powell, Colonel
Hardinge, Sir H.	Praed, W. T.
Heneage, G. W.	Pringle, A.
Hepburn, Sir T.	Pusey, P.
Herbert, hon. S.	Rae, Sir W.
Herries, rt. hon. J. C.	Richards, R.
Hinde, J. H.	Rickford, W.
Hodgson, F.	Rolleston, L.
Hodgson, R.	Rose, rt. hon. Sir G.
Hogg, J. W.	Round, J.
Holmes, W. A. C.	Rushbrooke, Colonel
Holmes, W.	Rushout, G.
Hope, hon. C.	Sanderson, R.
Hope, H. T.	Sandon, Lord
Hope, G. W.	Scarlett, J. Y.
Hotham, Lord	Shaw, right hon. F.
Houldsworth, T.	Sheppard, T.
Hughes, W. B.	Shirley, E. J.
Hume, J.	Sinclair, Sir G.
Ingestre, Lord	Smith, A.
Inglis, Sir R. H.	Smyth, Sir G. H.
Irton, S.	Somerset, Lord G.
Jackson, Sergeant	Sotherton, T. E.
James, Sir W.	Spry, Sir S. T.
Jermyn, Lord	Stanley, E.
Jervis, S.	Stanley, Lord
Johnstone, H.	Stormont, Lord
Jones, J.	Sugden, rt. hn. Sir E.
Jones, Captain	Sutton, hon. J. H. T.
Kelly, F.	Teignmouth, Lord
Kirk, P.	Tennent, J. E.
Knatchbull, Sir E.	Thompson, Mr. Aid.
Knight, H. G.	Trench, Sir F.
Knightley, Sir C.	Tyrell, Sir J. T.
Knox, hon. T.	Vere, Sir C. B.
Law, hon. C. E.	Verner, Colonel
Liddell, H. T.	Villiers, Lord
Lincoln, Earl of	Vivian, J.
Litton, E.	Waddington, H. S.
Lockhart, A. M.	Welby, G.
Lowther, J. H.	Whitmore, T. C.
Lygon, hon. Gen.	Wilmot, Sir J.
Mackenzie, T.	Wood, Colonel T.
Mackenzie, W. F.	Wynn, C.
Mahon, Lord	Young, J.
Meynell, Captain	Young, Sir W.
Miles, W.
Miles, P. W. S.	TELLERS.
Milnes, R. M.	Clerk, Sir G.
Neeld, J.	Fremantle, Sir T.

List of the NOES.
Abercromby, G.	Aglionby, Major
Adam, Admiral	Alston, R.

Archbold, R.	Hodges, T. L.
Bainbridge, E. T.	Howard, F. J.
Baines, E.	Howard, P. H.
Bannerman, A.	Howick, Lord
Baring, F. T.	Humphery, J.
Barnard, E. G.	Hutton, B.
Barry, G. S.	James, W.
Beamish, F. B.	Labouchere, H.
Bellew, R. M.	Lambton, H.
Berkeley, hon. C.	Langdale, hon. G.
Bernal, R.	Lemon, Sir C.
Bewes, T.	Lennox, Lord G.
Blake, M. J.	Loch, J.
Blake, W. J.	Lushington, C.
Bodkin, J. J.	Lushington, S.
Bowes, J.	Lynch, A. H.
Briscoe, J. I.	Macaulay, T. B.
Brocklehurst, J.	Macleod, R.
Brodie, W. D.	M'Taggart, J.
Brotherton, J.	Marshall, W.
Bulwer, Sir L.	Martin, J.
Busfeild, W.	Maule, hon. F.
Byng, G.	Melgund, Lord
Callaghan, D.	Morpeth, Lord
Campbell, Sir J.	Morris, D.
Campbell, W. F.	Muntz, G. F.
Chapman, Sir M.	Murray, A.
Clive, E. B.	Muskett, G. A.
Collier, J.	Nagle, Sir R.
Collins, W.	Noel, hon. C. G.
Corbally, M. E.	Norreys, Sir D.
Craig, W. G.	O'Brien, W. S.
Crawford, W.	O'Callaghan, C.
Curry, Sergeant	O'Connell, D
Dalmeny, Lord	O'Connell, M. J.
D'Eyncourt, C. T.	O'Connell, M.
Divett, E.	O'Ferrall, R. M.
Donkin, Sir R. S.	Ord, W.
Dundas, F.	Paget, F.
Elliot, hon. J. E.	Palmerston, Lord
Ellice, Captain A.	Parker, J.
Ellice, rt. hon. E.	Parnell, Sir H.
Ellis, W.	Pattison, J.
Erle, W.	Pechell, Captain
Evans, Sir De L.	Phillips, Sir R.
Evans, W.	Pigot, D. R.
Ferguson, Sir R.	Protheroe, E.
Fitzalan, Lord	Pryme, G.
Fitzroy, Lord C.	Ramsbottom, J.
Fleetwood, Sir P.	Redington, T. N.
Ford, J.	Rich, H.
French, F.	Roche, E. B.
Gillon, W. D.	Roche, W.
Gordon, R.	Rumbold, C. E.
Greg, R. H.	Russell, Lord J.
Greig, D.	Rutherfurd, A.
Grey, Sir G.	Salwey, Colonel
Guest, Sir J.	Scholefield, J.
Hall, Sir B.	Scrope, G. P.
Handley, H.	Seale, Sir J. H.
Harland, W. C.	Seymour, Lord
Hastie, A.	Sharpe, General
Hawkins, J. H.	Sheil, rt. hon. R.
Heathcoat, J.	Shelborne, Earl
Hector, C. J.	Smith, J. A.
Hobhouse, Sir J.	Smith, B.
Hobhouse, T. B.	Smith, R.

Somers, J. P.	Vigors, N. A.
Somerville, Sir W.	Villiers, hon. C.
Stansfield, W. R. C.	Vivian, J. H.
Stewart, J.	Vivian, Sir R. H.
Stuart, Lord J.	Walker, R.
Stuart, W. V.	Wallace, R.
Stock, Dr.	Warburton, H.
Strangways, J.	White, A.
Street, E.	Williams, W. A.
Style, Sir C.	Winnington, Sir T.
Surrey, Earl	Wood, C.
Talfourd, Sergeant	Wood, Sir M.
Tancred, H. W.	Wood, B.
Thornley, T.	Wyse, T.
Townley, R. G.	Yates, J. A.
Troubridge, Sir E.
Tufnell, H.	TELLERS.
Turner, E.	Stanley, E. J.
Verney, Sir H.	Steuart, R.
Paired off.
AYES.	NOES.
Mr. C. Forrester	Colonel Anson
Mr. Pakington	Mr. Horseman
Mr. Archdall	Lord Leveson
Mr. Palmer	O'Connor Don
Mr. Mackinnon	Sir G. Staunton
Mr. Green	Mr. Sand ford
Mr. Barneby	Captain Winnington
Mr. Bradshaw	Sir R. Dundas
Sir J. Walsh	Mr. Oswald