§ MR. ALFRED DAVIES (Carmarthen Boroughs)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies, having regard to the fact that Mr. Charles Leonard, before the Select Committee on British South Africa, stated that the Transvaal annual revenue was £150,000 before the gold discoveries and between £4,000,000 and £5,000,000 in 1896, nearly the whole of the burden of such taxation falling upon the gold industry, whereas Sir David Barbour in his Report suggested the levying of an annual taxation of about £500,000 on the gold mining companies, and the release of these companies to an amount of £600,000 per annum through the cancelling of the dynamite monopoly, whether he can state how it is proposed to raise the £2,832,000, the total yearly cost of the Transvaal Administration, as estimated by Sir David Barbour.
§ THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (Mr. J. CHAMBERLAIN,) Birmingham, W.I am not prepared to 424 state in detail at present how the cost of the Transvaal Administration will be met, but I would point out to the hon. Member that Sir David Barbour estimates the revenue at £3,467,000, independently of the produce of the proposed tax on the net profits of the gold mines.
§ MR. ALFRED DAVIESOn what page? I cannot find it.
§ MR. J. CHAMBERLAINThe Report is a very short one, and the hon. Member will have no difficulty in finding it; but I will show it to him after questions are over if he wishes it.