§ MR. BELLAIRS (Lynn Regis)To ask the Secretary to the Treasury, in view of the fact that the £22,000 paid in lieu of rates for the ordnance factories under the Civil Service Votes is repaid as an Appropriation-in-Aid, and is, in accordance with business principles included in proportionate charges for all work done at those factories, whether the Treasury will consider the advisability of adopting a similar procedure in regard to Navy Estimates, and cause the Royal dockyards to repay as an Appropriation-in-Aid the sum of upwards of £60,000, which the Civil Service Estimates will in future be called upon to pay in respect of rates for the Royal dockyards.
(Answered by Mr. Edmund Robertson.) A comparison cannot well be made between the dockyards and the ordnance factories. Funds are not provided directly by Parliament for the latter, which are conducted like an ordinary trading concern, the actual outlay being reclaimed within the year from the Departments on account of which the work is performed. It is not proposed to alter the present practice as regards the dockyards.