§ MR. A. O'CONNOR (Donegal, E.)I beg to ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether the Dublin Port and Docks Board pay a large annual sum to the Collector of Customs for collecting their warehouse rates; and whether this is the same officer who has to sanction or refuse the use of any other trader's warehouse?
§ * THE SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Sir J. T. HIBBERT,) OldhamThe Collector of Customs at Dublin has been appointed by the Dublin Port and Docks Board to collect the dues payable to that Board. These dues are not confined to warehouse rates, and the warehouse rates are not in any case collected by the Collector of Customs. The power of sanctioning or refusing the use of premises as bonded warehouses at Dublin, or at any other port in the United Kingdom, rests with the Board of Customs in London, subject to the control of the Treasury, and not with the collectors at the ports.
§ MR. A. O'CONNORI beg to ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how the 51 non-Government Customs warehouses in Ireland are situated: how many in Belfast, how many in Dublin, Cork, &c.; and why they are granted in Belfast, and not elsewhere?
§ * SIR J. T. HIBBERTThe largest of the Customs bonded warehouses in the Port of Cork—situated on the Custom House Quay—is the property of the Crown, and is rented by a local firm, by whom it is held available for the general accommodation of bonders; but the Board of Customs have no information, as to whether, on this account, Cork merchants prefer to bond iu London or elsewhere.