§ But they were only temporary palliatives, and, looking to the circumstances which I have endeavoured, I am afraid very imperfectly, to detail to the Committee, I am convinced of this, that in the true interests of the Sinking Fund we should not only now prolong the Savings Bank annuity, as I have suggested, and set up other annuities besides, but we should reduce the fixed debt charge from £25,000,000 to £23,000,000 a year. Sir, if we do that we shall still have left this year a sum of £5,816,000, increasing annually in future years, for the redemption ofdebt—a sum greater in proportion to the total amount of the debt, and much greater in proportion to the purchasable amount of the debt, than was considered sufficient in past years. I may say that it amounts to a percentage of 1.6 per cent. on the amount of Consols in the hands of the public, and that that is a greater percentage than has at any time been applied inside the fixed debt charge to the redemption of debt except during the last four years. Well, Sir, of course I may be told that my arguments with reference to the past are insufficient, that we are richer than our predecessors, and should do more than they did for the reduction of debt. Yes, Sir, we are richer, but we also bear far greater burdens. When, in 1875, Sir Stafford Northcote set up the fixed Debt charge he had to provide the sum of £10,785,000 for the Navy; I have 1016 to provide £26,595,000. He had to provide £14,678,000 for the Army; I have to provide £20,617,000. He had to provide £12,656,000 for Civil Service Estimates; I have to provide £22,180,000. Sir, it is quite true that the ability of our people to bear taxation and the yield of our revenue have greatly increased since those days; but I ventured three years ago in my Budget Speech to draw a comparison, which I think was accepted by the Committee, between the increase in our revenue and the increase in our expenditure during the 20 preceding years. I showed how there had been an increase in our revenue, but I showed also how the increase in our expenditure had been infinitely greater; and I am sorry to add that the results of the three years that have since passed have still further increased that disproportion. But, perhaps, I may be told also: "Oh, it is true that the taxpayers of to-day have some right to benefit by the falling in of these great annual charges, but the taxpayers who ought to benefit by the falling in of the Savings Bank Annuity of £2,200.000 are not the taxpayers of the present day, but the taxpayers of 1902."Sir, I claim that I have a right to bespeak this windfall, as I propose to bespeak it on behalf of the taxpayers of the present day. What have we done for those who may succeed us in 1902?
§ SIR W. HARCOURT () Monmouthshire, W.Hear, hear !
§ * THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERI will tell the right honourable Member the Member for West Monmouthshire what we have done for them. We have done this: We have, at a cost of almost untold millions, during the past few years provided a Navy so admirable in its strength and in its efficiency, so far greater in those respects than any that can challenge comparison with it, that there is no doubt. I believe, in the minds of the great majority of the people that the obvious strength of that Navy has been a main factor during the past year in saving us from a great war, the burden of which would have fallen not only on ourselves. but hardly less heavily on those who may succeed us in 1902. And further, though it. is a much smaller matter, in the three years ending March 1898 1017 the taxpayers produced out of their pockets £9,000,000 more than were required for the services of those three years. Those £9,000,000 have been devoted by us not to our own benefit, but to relieving the taxpayers of the future from a charge to that amount for permanent naval and military works and public buildings, instead of borrowing a loan for that purpose, as justice and precedent would have authorised us to do. But, most of all, I would say that it is in the interests of the taxpayers of 1902, as well as in our own, that the relief, through the falling in of these annuities, which is so near at hand, should be so equitably apportioned over the years that are to come that it should enable a persistent and continuous reduction of Debt to be effected. I believe that my proposals strengthen and safeguard the Sinking Fund; as such I commend them to the favourable consideration of the Committee. I think the Committee for the patient attention which it has devoted to what I fear is a very imperfect explanation; but I would add that in so difficult and complicated a matter as this it is only right that the full details and explanations should be in the possession of the Members of the House, and that to-morrow morning I hope that a Treasury Minute will be in their hands containing those full explanations.