SECOND READING. [ADJOURNED DEBATE.] (Hansard, 7 August 1893)

§ MR. CHAPLIN (Lincolnshire, Sleaford)
said, that before the Bill was read a second time he must ask the House to let him make a few observations upon it. He had no desire to interfere with any object which the Bill had in view; but he must point out that they were being asked by the Government to embark upon an entirely new method of procedure so far as the finance of the measure was concerned. If he understood rightly the figures given in answer to a question which he put to the President of the Board of Agriculture on Friday last, the estimated expenditure under the Bill for the current financial year up to March 31, 1894, was £130,000 by England and Ireland combined. Towards meeting that, the Government had at their disposal two sums in connection with the Pleuro-Pneumonia Act, which amounted together to very nearly the sum required; and, in addition, the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposed to give £50,000 for the purposes of the Bill. So far so good, and as regarded the present financial year there was nothing left to be desired. But in the Estimates for 1894–5 the expenditure for that year for the Board of Agriculture was put down at £250,000, and all that there was to meet that sum was what might be left of the £130,000, plus the £50,000 for the first year. Consequently, only £50,000 was provided by the Government to meet an expenditure estimated at £250,000. How was the remaining expenditure to be met? The Board of Agriculture, under the Pleuro-Pneumonia Act, had power to draw upon the Local Taxation Fund in England and the Cattle Diseases Fund in Ireland for any sums that might be required, in addition to the moneys provided out of the Imperial 1525 Funds, or, in other words, the greater part of the expenditure was to be met out of the rates. He ventured to say-that that was an entirely new departure in Parliamentary practice. The right hon. Gentleman might point to the precedent of a Bill introduced by the Conservative Government some years ago, in which it was stated that if the Imperial Funds provided were not equal to the occasion for which they were needed the Board were to be empowered, as a last resource, to draw upon the Local Taxation Fund. But there was this great and marked difference between the two cases —that whereas when the earlier Bill was introduced Imperial Funds were provided for the full amount of the estimated expenditure, in the present case, while the estimate was £250,000, it was deliberately intended that the Central Authority should carry out the Bill by means of funds which were provided out of local rates, but over which neither ratepayers in England nor in Ireland were to have any control whatever. That was an entirely new precedent and practice on the part of Parliament, and he was bound to say that it raised very serious questions for consideration. In particular, hon. Members on that side of the House—Members who had always advocated the placing of matters such as that dealt with by the present Bill in the hands of a Central Authority—in a very difficult position. For his own part, he had always been anxious that such a measure should be proceeded with; but, at the same time, he had been anxious that the question should be entrusted to a Central Authority. At the same time, his anxiety for the passage of some such measure was so strong that he was not disposed to object to the Second Reading; but he trusted it would be distinctly understood that his friends and himself were at full liberty to do their best to amend the Bill in Committee in respect of the matters which he had submitted to the House. He hoped he might be able to induce the Government to take a more reasonable view of the situation, and to do in the present case what was done by the Conservative Government on a former occasion. Unless he could do that, he repeated, he must reserve his right to oppose the Bill at a later stage.

§ MR. T. W. RUSSELL (Tyrone, S.)
asked whether the Bill would extend to Ireland? If it proposed to increase Irish rates he should oppose it.

§ THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE (Mr. H. GARDNER, Essex, Saffron Walden)
said, that the local rates would not be increased; they would be relieved. At present Local Authorities contributed to the efforts to extinguish the disease. By the Bill the localities would be relieved from contributing at all, as the ultimate recourse would be to the Local Taxation Fund The estimates of the Board officials were, he himself thought, very much over the mark. The right hon. Gentleman knew that it was the general practice of officials never to uuder-estimate—it was a less offence to over-estimate by thousands than to under-estimate by hundreds.

§ MR. LONG (Liverpool, West Derby)
thought that when the right hon. Gentleman stated that local rates would be relieved he must be under a misapprehension. In what direction would they be relieved? If the £50,000 provided by the State were exceeded, the balance would come out of the Local Taxation Fund, and that was exhausted already up to the last penny. The House was not entitled to ask the ratepayers to contribute a large additional sum in the expenditure of which they would not be consulted at all. The Local Taxation Fund was one created by the late Government for the purpose of relieving rates; but they had had it from the Front Ministerial Bench that Session that rates had actually been increased. They who sat on that side of the House had always taken the view that all forms of cattle disease should be extinguished; but they also held that the expense of bringing about that desirable end—or, at least, a part of such cost—should be defrayed out of the Imperial Exchequer. According to the Bill before them, it really seemed that the authority in 1527 London would only have to act, and that the Local Authority, wherever it might be, would only have to pay.

§ MR. GOSCHEN (St. George's, Hanover Square)
thought that it ought to be fully stated to the House what local expenditure would be affected. If £200,000 were withdrawn from the Local Taxation Fund, as would be the case, if the estimate of the right hon. Gentleman's advisers was correct, what would be the effect on Local Authorities generally? That contribution would be from town and country alike. Consequently, London, for instance, would have to bear a proportion of the expenditure incurred for the extinction of swine fever, with the result that expenditure on London improvements must be lessened.

§ MR. H. GARDNER
suggested that the question would be better answered in Committee.