§ I have still, therefore, £1,972,000 available to meet contingencies or for the reduction of taxation. I greatly regret that it is not in my power to propose any relief to the income-tax payers. I said last year, and I hold now, that an income-tax of 1s. in the £ in time of peace is more than ought to be demanded of them, and leaves us too small a reserve in case of the emergency of, war. I shall not be satisfied with our financial position until we have been able to reduce the tax to a more moderate figure. But 1067 the amount at my disposition, after adding to the Sinking Fund, is unequal to the task of giving them any relief. The reduction of the income-tax by 1d. would cost£2,200,000 in the current year, and as the committee know the sum at my disposal is less than £2,000,000.
§ Setting aside this course, therefore, as beyond my power, I choose tea as the subject for relief; and I choose it for three reasons. In the first place, Sir, the tea duty is the only tax which stands to-day at a higher figure than it ever attained during the period of the late war; and it, therefore, has a prior claim to relief over other indirect taxes, which, if they were raised during the war, have not been again raised since the war. In the second place, I choose tea because it is an article of almost universal consumption, and the relief, therefore, will find its way to every household in the kingdom. And I choose tea, in the third place, because our present supplies of this article come almost entirely from British Colonies and dependencies, and it was with avowed reluctance that last year I chose such an article to be the subject of an increase in taxation. I propose, therefore, to devote the remainder of my surplus to removing, as from July 1st next, the date on which the present duty expires, the additional 2d. on tea which was imposed last year. I shall be prepared to defend the date which I to have chosen if it is challenged. It is sufficient to say at present that the money available is not sufficient to reduce the duty as from the present time. I estimate that the cost of that concession will be£1,550,000 in the current year.