§ MR. LEAI beg to ask the Prime Minister whether His Majesty's Government intend to propose any alteration in the settled system of Parliamentary control over Army expenditure or in the powers and responsibilities either of the Public Accounts Committee, the Comptroller and Auditor General, Accounting Officers, or Sub-Accounting Officers, and will he undertake that no such alteration shall be made without being previously submitted to this House; have His Majesty's Government any intention of adopting the proposal of the Secretary of State for War for so altering the present system as to make the soldier the economist, to rely upon him for telling Parliament how to make the money go furthest, and to give him a free hand in doing so; and do His Majesty's Government intend to depart in any way from the declaration and recommendations of the Report of the Public Accounts Committee of 26th May, 1905, which Report received the sanction of this House on 26th July, 1905.
§ SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMANThese appear to be Questions which are being considered by the House in Committee on The Territorial and Reserve Forces Bill; and it is in the course of those discussions that an Answer ought to be and will be given to them. I know of no proposal or intention to curtail Parliamentary control over Army expenditure. Any alterations in the control of Parliament over expenditure by way of accounts would have to be proposed with due regard to the constitutional practice, and with due regard also to any Resolution of this House. Questions of economy and of the merit 100 of expenditure would come before it as a matter of estimate rather than of accounting.