MR. PAGETasked the President of the Board of Trade, Whether he is prepared to take immediate steps to obtain further information as to the method by which the official corn averages are now taken, and into the fluctuations of the Tithe Rent Charge?
§ VISCOUNT SANDONThe Board of Trade during the last two years have been taking various steps to elicit information and communicate it to the public respecting the corn averages, and lately we have been in communication on this subject with the Tithe Commissioners and the Inland Revenue Department, by whose officers, mainly, the Returns are collected, and the inquiries are still proceeding. Some weeks ago my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for East Essex (Colonel Brise) informed me that he proposed to move for a Select Committee to inquire into the matter on the 23rd of this month; and I told him that, as the subject was a very 1205 complicated one, and one which naturally excited great interest in many parts of the country, I thought it was very desirable that such a Committee as he proposed should be appointed, and that such an appointment should have the support of the Government. I have every hope of being able, when Parliament re-assembles in the month of May, to support my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for East Essex in proposing such a Committee to the House.