§ MR. RICHsaid, he wished to put a question to the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer. In the statement which he made to the House the other night, the right hon. Gentleman said that 30,000l. would be the loss which the country would suffer from the reduction in the taxation of the clergy from 7d. to B¼d. in the pound. Now, as 30,000l. on that datum represented an income of 4,000,000l. per annum, the inference was that the right hon. Chancellor of the Exchequer intended to include in his exemption the whole body of the clergy, rich as well as poor—bishops, deans, pluralists—non-resident incumbents, &c. Was such the intention of the right hon. Gentleman?
§ The CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, that the hon. Gentleman had quite misconceived the effect of the new Schedule proposed, and he was quite willing to believe that this misconception arose from his (the Chancellor of the Exchequer's) imperfect explanation of it. What he had said, at all events intended to say, was, that it being impossible to assess clergymen under any other schedule than Schedule A, by reason of the tenure of the property on which they paid the duty, and it being at the same time very hard indeed upon a clergyman to make him pay upon 100l. the full amount assessed upon the class of property in respect of which he ostensibly derived his income, whereas a Dissenting minister, with also 100l. per annum, would be only assessed as for 100l. salary, he proposed that some special clause should be introduced for placing the clergyman in a not less favourable position in this respect than the Dissenting minister.