§ MR. WATT (Glasgow, Camlachie)asked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, If the imposition of a surtaxe d'entrepôt upon the owner of a British steamer carrying goods consigned to a French port, under a through bill of lading to be transhipped at an English port, is in contravention of Article 2 of the Treaty concluded with France in February 1882?
§ THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JAMES FERGUSSON) (Manchester, N.E.)The surtaxe d'entrepôt is an additional duty charged on goods the produce of a country out of Europe, when imported into France not direct from the country of their origin but through a third country. According to French law and practice, the surtaxe is levied whether such goods are landed and warehoused in the third country, or whether they are simply transhipped in one of its ports. It has never been held that the surtaxe d'entrepôt is included among the transit duties referred to in the Second Article of the Treaty of 1882, and it, consequently, does not come within the stipulations of the Treaty of 1882.