§ SIR C. DILKE (Gloucester, Forest of Dean)I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether any serious attempt is to be made during the present Parliament to carry a Land Tax Commissioners' Names Bill, such as is usually passed in the first Session of each Parliament; whether, by the absence of 1343 such an Act, the Land Tax Commissioners, by whom the Income Tax Commissioners are appointed, will gradually be reduced so as to consist of the ex-officio Commissioners, namely, county magistrates only; and whether a Treasury Circular pointed out some time ago that there ought to be some representatives of urban interests on a body which appoints the Income Tax Commissioners?
THE FINANCIAL SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. R. W. HANBURT,) PrestonThe answer to the first paragraph is in the affirmative; the answer to the last is in the negative. In the absence of such an Act as that to which reference is made, it is, no doubt, true that the Land Tax Commissioners would ultimately consist of ex-officio Commissioners only; but the time which has elapsed since the last Act was passed is only six years, or about the life of a Parliament.
§ SIR C. DILKEIt is intended to go on with the Bill?
§ MR. HANBURYYes, certainly.
§ MR. HERBERT LEWIS (Flint Boroughs)I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether he is aware that inconvenience has arisen in consequence of the Commissioners of Land Tax being summoned to attend meetings of the Commissioners by notice in the official Gazette only; and whether provision will be made in the Land Tax Commissioners' Names Bill, or otherwise, that the Commissioners shall receive personally due notice in writing of the time and place at which meetings are to be held?
§ MR. HANBURYIt is for the Clerk to the Commissioners to take such steps as he may consider necessary to secure a sufficient attendance at their meetings, and it is open to the Commissioners themselves to give instructions to their clerk if they have any reason to be dissatisfied with the manner in which lie performs his duties. I am not aware that there has been any impediment to the dispatch of public business through negligence on the part of the clerks in this respect; and I do not think that there is any necessity for such legislation as the honourable Member suggests. The fewer changes that are made in this formal Bill the better.