§ MR. CANDLISHasked the Secretary to the Treasury, On what authority and on what principle the capital value of Terminable Annuities existing in 1815 was determined, and which, added to the Funded and Unfunded Debt, raised the total National Debt of that year to £902,264,000, as stated in the Budget speech of 1866; if he can give a Return showing the capital value of these An- 984 nuities, calculated on the same principle, for each year between 1815 and 1855; and, if that is the same principle on which the capital value of Terminable Annuities have been annually appraised from 1855 to the present time?
§ MR. BAXTERSir, it does not seem to have been the practice formerly to include the capital value of the Terminable Annuities in statements of the National Debt. The capital value of the Terminable Annuities existing in 1815 was approximatively computed at £41,225,000 by Mr. Finlaison, the actuary of the National Debt Office; in 1866 that sum represented their value in Three Per Cent Stock, and was included by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the total amount of £902,264,000 at which he estimated the National Debt for 1815. It would not be difficult to make a similar computation of the capital value of the Terminable Annuities from 1835 to 1855, or to the present time; but it would cost much labour to compute their value from 1815 to 1835, no calculations of the kind having been made for those years. The computation of the capital value of annuities has been made on the same principle since 1835.