§ CAPTAIN NORTONI beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether, seeing that of the 581 pensioners in Chelsea Hospital only eight do not use tobacco, he will consider the advisability of allotting from the contraband tobacco in the Queen's Warehouse sufficient to give to each pensioner a pipe a day, since the only objection raised, namely, the possibility of sale, may be safely disregarded owing to the extremely limited extent to which it could take place?
§ MR. HANBURYThe grant of seized tobacco is confined in the first instance to cases where the tobacco would otherwise be charged upon the Votes. This covers not only the Kew and Edinburgh Botanic Gardens, but also the Criminal Lunatics at Broadmoor and Dundrum, tobacco allowance for whom used to be borne on the Votes. If a surplus of tobacco still remains over, it is given under an arrangement made in 1893 to troops going on foreign service. Such troops had always been entitled to get their tobacco duty free, and the grant therefore does not displace any duty-paid tobacco. At present, however, the issue to the troops has had to be suspended, as the supply has run short. The case of the Chelsea pensioners is, therefore, not analogous. There is no tobacco allowance for them charged on the Votes, and they are not entitled to get their tobacco duty-free. Apart from the possibility of their selling the tobacco, the hon. and gallant Member will see from what I have said that any grant made to them would be taken from troops going on foreign service.