§ SUPPLY—considered in Committee.
§ (In the Committee.)
§ THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERMr. Dodson, I have delayed as long as possible bringing this matter before the Committee because I hoped to be able to accompany it with a more satisfactory explanation than, unhappily, I am at present in a position to make; but as it is necessary that the business should be gone through before Easter, I hope the Committee will accept that circumstance as an excuse for my coming before them so imperfectly prepared to answer the questions which may be reasonably asked of me with regard to the details of this expenditure. I have received no further official information from the Indian Government since the telegram of the 17th of December, and the information—such as it is—that I possess, is compiled from very rough accounts sent home to us by Mr. Turner—the gentleman who was sent out from this country to superintend the expenditure in India. It is necessary, however, that the Indian Government should be re-imbursed some portion, at any rate, of the expenditure without any further delay; and that is 642 my excuse for coming to the House more imperfectly provided with information than is desirable. The payments actually made for the expedition to Abyssinia—and in stating this I stand on a sure ground—are as follows:—The War Office has expended £461,000; the Admiralty has expended £1,262,000; the Government of India (according to Mr. Turner's estimate) has expended £7,040,000; and the total expenditure, therefore, adding these sums together, amounts to £8,763,000. Having stated the payments which we have some knowledge of, though I cannot undertake to state that the sum said to have been paid in India is the whole payment—I have no doubt it will amount to as much as that, but I cannot say whether it will not be more—the Committee will, I think, like to have a rough Estimate of the heads of expenditure under which this money will be brought to charge. This Estimate is taken from very rough accounts furnished to us by Mr. Turner from Bombay, and can only be taken as a general approximation. Now, this is what has been furnished to me, and it is the only information I am able to give with a view of satisfying the very reasonable curiosity of the Committee. Staff pay and batta (which does not mean the pay of the soldiers, but the extra pay they received while on foreign soil), £319,000; stores and supplies, £563,000; mules, camels, and forage (not including sea transport), £1,400,000; land transport—namely, the transport in Abyssinia and the railway and transport to and from Magdala, £1,345,000; sea transport, £4,232,000; coals, £.581,000; miscellaneous, £160,000; making a total of £8,600,000. That is the amount, as far as we can ascertain, of the expenditure for the Abyssinian Expedition. Of this sum £5,000,000 has been provided for by a tax of 1d. on income in the year 1867–8, and by an addition of 2d. to the income-tax in 1868–9. It is necessary, therefore, that we should provide a further sum of £3,606,000. My duty is to ask the House to-night to grant the means of paying that sum; but how that sum is to be met is a question which, if I may be permitted to do so, I would rather reserve till I make my Financial Statement. All I ask at present is that we may be enabled to pay the money, which is, of course, greatly needed by the Indian Government, which had made 643 such, heavy disbursements on our account. The army and navy expenses we know exactly. They amount altogether to £1,723,000. The rest we know only approximately; but it is not likely to fall short of the sum which I have mentioned. I only hope it will not much exceed it. It is not my business, in making this Motion, to do more than merely state the facts of the case as far as I know them. There will be a deduction from this sum on account of certain savings in the War Department of £157,000, which will reduce the amount to be provided for to £3,606,000, and the Resolution I have to submit to the Committee is one authorizing that expenditure. I have, I think, nothing to add beyond the remark that these accounts are in some respects more meagre than I could have wished, while they are in other respects more full than I anticipated. The right hon. Gentleman concluded by moving the Resolution of which he had given notice.
§
Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a sum, not exceeding £3,600,000, be granted to Her Majesty, towards defraying the Expenses of the Expedition to Abyssinia, beyond the ordinary Grants of Parliament for Army and Navy Services.
§ MR. HUNTsaid, that the hon. Member for Brighton (Mr. White) had alluded pointedly to a statement that he (Mr. Hunt) had made to the House in his official capacity, and, therefore, he felt called on to say a few words on the subject. His right hon. Friend (Sir Stafford Northcote) had fully explained to the House that the Government of the day had placed before the House all the information that they possessed; and for himself he could only say that he had never kept back anything from the House, but gave it all the information he possessed. His right hon. Friend had explained the great difficulty which there was in obtaining reliable Estimates of the expenditure. It was obvious that as the expedition had to be fitted out almost entirely in Bombay, it could not be estimated for in the same way as one sent out from this country. He had also explained the shortness of time that there was for furnishing the expedition caused great difficulty in communicating between this country and India. Last year when they laid the Estimates on the table they asked for 644 £3,000,000, they acted on the best information they could then obtain, and the statement that they could not then obtain better information was fully borne out by what had just been stated by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who told them that he is even now able to furnish but a mere skeleton account of the expenses incurred. So far from being informed when they proposed the Estimate for £3,000,000 that it would be insufficient, he was, he believed, correct in saying that it was not until the 10th of August that the late Government received any information of an official character from India that led them to suppose that the Estimate would be exceeded. After Parliament had adjourned they were informed by Mr. Turner that, according to the best calculations he could make, the expenditure in India would be £5,350,000; and on the 9th of November last the India Office informed the Treasury that, according to their calculation, the expenditure would amount to £5,134,000; so that the best information in November fell very far short of the figures which the Chancellor of the Exchequer had just stated. There was a still more remarkable thing. He found from documents, for access to which he was indebted to the courtesy of the right hon. Gentleman, that so late as the 8th of December last—that was after the late Government had resigned Office, but before the new Government had been formed—a telegram was received from India stating that the expenditure to that time was estimated at £5,750,000; and nine days later there was another telegram which stated that the expenditure in India would be £7,000,000. Indeed, down to a very late period their information did not show that the expenditure would be anything like the amount now stated. These facts would entirely exonerate the late Government from the suspicion of having kept back facts which ought to have been stated to the House. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had stated that all the information which he could lay before the House had been furnished by Mr. Turner, a gentleman who had been sent out by the late Government to examine the accounts in India. It was only justice to that gentleman to say, that by the great energy and ability he had displayed, the confidence of the late Government in him was fully justified, and he felt sure that the Chancellor of 645 the Exchequer could fully rely upon that gentleman's figures. It was no doubt an appalling sum that they were now called on to vote, and the excess had come upon himself and his Colleagues by surprise. But there was this consolation, that though like Englishmen they had to grumble and pay, this expedition had been a great success; the philanthropic object in view had been fully attained with the sacrifice of hardly any lives on our part. He hoped that this expenditure, vast as it was, would be the means of saving expenditure in future; for the result of the expedition was to show that the arm of this country was long enough to reach the most remote land where English subjects had suffered grievances which required redress. He hoped that this expenditure would prevent great expenditure in little wars, such as in times past they had had in their Eastern dominions; and that, therefore, the money would not have been thrown away. Should such be the result, they might congratulate themselves that the expedition had been undertaken.
MR. WHITEacquitted the late Government of any intention to deceive the House of Commons. What he complained of was that the Imperial Government should have been so deplorably ill-informed. That was disgraceful to our system of administration. The recklessness, waste, and confusion were almost incredible. Let one instance suffice—They had officers competing with one another in the purchase of mules, and some were sent to places where those artificial productions were not even known. He should be glad to have a Committee to inquire into the whole outlay if the Government thought it expedient. ["Move!"] If, hereafter, he were supported he would move. Even the present Vote did not, he believed, include the whole cost, which would probably prove to be at least £10,000,000.
§ MR. DENTexpressed his astonishment at the meagreness of the information which had been laid before the Committee on the subject. Telegraphic messages had been received from Mr. Turner, but they appeared to be accompanied by no details. He should like to know who had had the power of spending the money.
§ SIR PATRICK O'BRIENregretted that the hon. Member for Brighton (Mr. 646 White) had not taken a more practical course by moving for a Committee of Inquiry. When, on a former occasion, he had estimated the cost of the expedition as likely to be £10,000,000, his statement had been received with derision. The fact was there had boon great mismanagement in many respects in connection with its organization. Officers had, for instance, been sent out to Barcelona to buy mules who knew nothing of Spanish, while others had been despatched on a similar errand to the Levant who could not speak a word of Italian. To show the anxiety of the House to prevent similar mismanagement, at least for the future, he thought that all the circumstances connected with this large expenditure should undergo inquiry. As an Amendment to the Vote, he begged to move—and he believed that the late Government would for their own honour support him—that a Select Committee should be appointed to inquire into this expenditure.
§ MR. SCLATER-BOOTHasked Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer whether any sums would be received in aid of this expenditure by the sale of stores and material which were landed on the coast of Abyssinia in the expectation that the troops might be detained in the country during the summer?
§ THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, the whole expenditure) amounted to £8,763,000. The sum of £157,000 has been received on account of army savings in reduction of the gross amount, which is thus reduced to £8,606,000; and, leaving out the £6,000, we ask for £3,600,000, £5,000,000 having been already paid. I have no information whatever as to the sale of old stores.
§ SIR PATRICK O'BRIEN, in consequence of the intimation from the Chairman, would substitute for his Amendment another—that the Chairman do report Progress.
§ Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again."—(Sir Patrick O'Brien.)
§ MR. HUNTsaid, he understood that the examined accounts sent home by Mr, Turner, who had proceeded to Bombay for the purpose, amounted to £4.300,000 647 of which sum the Indian Government had paid £4,000,000, and that it was not likely that any further accounts would be received until next May. He wished to know whether the Government had any further information?
§ THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERreplied that the examined accounts, as far as they went at present, amounted to £5,700,000. He could not say exactly when they might expect the remainder.
MR. GLADSTONEWith respect to the Motion for reporting Progress I wish to point out to my hon. Friend (Sir Patrick O'Brien) that I think he can hardly advance by means of that Motion the purpose he has in view. I cannot wonder at the great interest which is shown in this subject; but I do not think my hon. Friend has precisely considered the force of the argument used by the Chancellor of the Exchequer for granting this Vote to-night. The question is not one of incurring expenditure with our eyes open. It is a question of paying a debt which we have already incurred. Whether or not the Government of Bombay deserve all the credit given to them by the Gentlemen opposite I am not prepared at this moment to say. I should like to be very much better informed before giving an opinion on that point. But there is no doubt whatever that this expenditure has been incurred in good faith on the part of the Indian Government, under ample authority from the Government of this country, and the argument of the Chancellor of the Exchequer is that it is not right to keep the Indian Government out of its money for the advances so made. On the other hand, we are now closely approaching Easter. If the Motion for reporting Progress contemplates a considerable delay, we should only fall into the fresh irregularity of throwing this charge upon the expenditure of next year. If, on the contrary, the Motion contemplates a short delay only, we should approach the question in a week or a fortnight under quite as great disadvantages as at present, for we have not the smallest hope of receiving fresh information within any short period. I do not in the slightest degree venture to give any opinion upon the remaining question to which my hon. Friend and the hon. Member for Brighton (Mr. White) have referred, respecting the necessity of examining into this ques- 648 tion. That is a totally different matter; but the demand which is reluctantly, though necessarily, made to-night is a demand for money disbursed by those who were acting as our agents, and who are at present out of pocket in respect of these advances. Under these circumstances I hope my hon. Friend will not oppose the grant of this money to-night.
§ SIR PATRICK O'BRIENsaid, that, on the understanding that the Government would give the fullest information they could in reference to the items composing the Vote, he would withdraw his Motion.
§ Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
§ Original Question put, and agreed to.
§ House resumed.
§ Resolution to be reported To-morrow.
§ Committee to sit again To-morrow.