§ COLONEL HOWARD VINCENT (Sheffield, Central)I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies whether, under the Reciprocity Section of the United States M'Kinley Tariff Act, the Government of President Harrison has constrained Her Majesty's Government to grant admission, without Customs Duties or any other national, colonial, or municipal charge, to 58 classes of American goods, manufactured and otherwise, and a reduction in other classes of 50 per cent. and 25 per cent. on the duty designated in the respective Colonial tariffs, into the British Colonies of British Guiana, Trinidad, Tobago, Barbadoes, Antigua, Montserrat, St. Christopher, Nevis, Dominica, St. Vincent, and their dependencies; if such remission of duties in the Crown Colonies applies equally to the staple manufacturers of Sheffield and other parts of the British Empire, hitherto taxed from 7 to 10 per cent., and to the natural products of Canada, Newfoundland, and Australasia; if the United States will reciprocally give a free market or more favourable terms to similar articles, the production of such British Colonies, than to goods the production of the United Kingdom or other parts of the British Empire; if this fiscal change has met with the approval of the unofficial Members of the Legislative Councils of the several Colonies concerned; if the inhabitants thereof have been or will be consulted as to the levy of the Colonial revenues by direct instead of indirect taxation as heretofore; and if all Papers on the subject will be laid upon the Table?
§ BARON H. DE WORMSThe Colonies named in the first paragraph of the question have decided to lower or abolish their import duties upon certain articles of food and other goods entering largely into popular consumption. Such remission of duties applies to those articles whatever the country of their origin. There is no question of differential duties in the matter, nor was there any constraint upon Her Majesty's Government, who readily assented to a step in the direction of a policy of reduction of duties upon articles of food, which has been pressed upon the Colonies by successive Secretaries of State, and which had the approval of the unofficial Members of the Legislative Councils of the Colonies concerned. Any taxation required to make good the loss of revenue caused by the remissions to which I have referred has been the subject of Debate in the Legislatures of the Colonies concerned. Papers on the subject have been laid on the Table.
§ COLONEL HOWARD VINCENTI wish to ask whether the American Government have not obtained a remission of the duties on manufactured articles in the West India Islands named?
§ BARON H. DE WORMSI can add nothing to the answer I have given.