§ MR. STAPLETONsaid, he begged to ask the right hon. Chancellor of the Exchequer whether it was his intention to make persons who succeed to property under the shifting clause of a settlement, by which one property shifts from them on their succeeding to another, pay the duty to be imposed on succession on the whole value of the property to which they succeed, or merely on so much thereof as may be in excess of the value of the property which shifts from them?
§ The CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, that in considering the proper form of the Resolution to be submitted to the House with regard to the Legacy Duty, he found that both precedent and the prudence of keeping within the rules of the House dictated the use of very general terms indeed, and that it was impossible to introduce into that Resolution the various specifications which must necessarily be introduced with great care into the Bill, the subject being one of consider- 160 able perplexity. The matter to which the hon. Gentleman's question referred had been very carefully considered, and he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) should be prepared to announce the views of the Government with regard to it; but he would rather not make that statement orally in that House, because he thought it would lead from one point to another, and that the effect would be that he should give a very imperfect and deceptive picture of the provisions of the Bill. The Bill would be ready for introduction as soon as the House had adopted the Resolution upon the subject.