§ Considered in Committee.
§ [Mr. EMMOTT in the chair.]
§ (IN THE COMMITTEE.)
§ I. Whereas it appears by the Navy Appropriation Account for the year ended the 31st day of March, 1908, and the statement appended thereto, that the aggregate expenditure on Navy Services has not exceeded the aggregate sums appropriated for those Services, but that, as shown in the schedule hereto appended, the total differences between the Exchequer Grants for Navy Services and the net expenditure are as follows, viz:—
| £ | s. | d. | ||
| Total Surpluses | … | 888,815 | 18 | 5 |
| Total Deficits | … | 720,472 | 5 | 6 |
| Net Surplus | … | 168,343 | 12 | 11 |
§ And whereas the Lords Commissioners of His Majesty's Treasury have temporarily authorised the application of so much of the said total surpluses on certain Grants for Navy Services as is necessary to make good the said total deficits on other Grants for Navy Services.
§ 1. Motion made and Question proposed, That the application of such sums be sanctioned.—[Mr. Hobhouse.]
1368§ Sir FREDERICK BANBURYI would like to say a few words on this subject. I regret very much that I was obliged last night to prevent this Motion being taken at this stage after eleven o'clock, and what moved me to take that course was the very interesting Debate which took place in the year 1904–5 upon this question. In 1904 we had a discussion on this question, and the hon. Members who took part in it form a very striking list. There were six hon. Members on that occasion, every one of whom since has been advanced to high rank on the Government Bench. I am not taking part in the Debate with any idea that the same happy fate will befall me—[An HON. MEMBER: "Why not?"]—but merely because I desire as a financial, shall I say economist, to draw attention to the great discrepancy between the finance of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen when they are on this side of the House and attacking the finance of the Government, and their action when they have been rewarded by promotion to high office. The Debate was opened in 1904 by the right hon. Gentleman the Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Hobhouse); it was continued by the First Lord of the Admiralty (Mr. McKenna); the next speaker was the Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr. Lloyd-George), who was followed by the Postmaster-General (Mr. Buxton), and then by the hon. Member for Lichfield (Mr. T. C. 1369 Warner), and by the hon. Member who sits on the Treasury Bench, the Member for Flintshire (Mr. Herbert Lewis). These hon. and right hon. Gentlemen all advanced strong reasons against the practice of the Treasury sanctioning the diversion of large sums of money from the object for which they were Voted to other objects. I have looked back, and I find that the surpluses on the Navy were, in round figures, £255,000, and the deficit £237,000. ["What year?"] That is 1905. The speeches were made in 1904, but there were some speeches made in 1905, and I have a copy of them all. There, again, promotion followed one of the speakers, the hon. Member who is now Under-Secretary for the Colonies (Colonel Seely). He was very strong on the point, but for the moment I will deal with the 1904 surpluses. In that year the surpluses were £617,000 and the deficits £345,000. What are they now? Instead of there having been a reduction in these figures, I find that the surpluses are, in round figures, £888,000, and the deficits £720,000.
§ The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the ADMIRALTY (Dr. Macnamara)There were Supplementary Estimates.
§ Sir F. BANBURYThe hon. Gentleman says there were Supplementary Estimates, but he must know perfectly well that no form of finance was ever denounced more violently by his own party than that of Supplementary Estimates; yet this is the defence he brings forward, that we must allow for this increase because it is caused by Supplementary Estimates. I beg with all due deference to the hon. Gentleman to say that his defence is not good, because he is only advancing from one year to another. May I point out that the chief ground of objection of all these eminent authorities in 1904 was the ground of economy. The right hon. Gentleman the Financial Secretary to the Treasury said it might become hon. Members opposite to take no notice of what the Opposition said, but they intended to look into details of this kind with an eye to the future, when the deficits of the past might be noticed. I ask the right hon. Gentleman why he has not used that eye which he suggested in 1904 would be used with the avowed object of looking into the future? The future has now come, and why has he not looked into these matters, and prevented these very large over-estimates and these very large under-estimates? It is not necessary to point out that the same line of conduct "was pursued by all the other hon. and right 1370 hon. Gentlemen. The hon. Member for Flintshire actually went so far as to read a long extract from the Report of the Public Accounts Committee, and he told us that the Public Accounts Committee's recommendations were that these large deficits and surpluses should not occur, and that when they did occur they ought to be dealt with in this House, because otherwise it was dealing with money behind the back of Parliament, and so taking away from the House control over the finances of the country. What are right hon. and hon. Gentlemen doing now? They are carrying out in an exaggerated form the very practice which they condemned a short time ago. In the Debate of 1904 the hon. Member for Lichfield, recognised as a great financial authority, said that the surpluses and deficits arose because it was shortly after the war, but that when that period ended all this sort of thing would disappear. I suppose the period has ended, arid I ask the hon. Gentleman the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty why his Budgeting is so bad that there should be a deficiency of £310,000 on the matériel and £167,000 on the personnel of the Navy? That is not wages, it is merely matériel. I ask that question, and I ask my hon. Friend the Member for the Fareham Division (Mr. Arthur Lee) whether he can possibly throw any light on this question? The deficit under Vote A for personnel and under the Vote for materiel amount altogether to £477,000. I ask the Financial Secretary to the Treasury the reason of that? Is it or is it not because the Admiralty have been living upon their stores for the past three or four years, and have been showing savings which did not exist in reality, but which really amounts to this, that they were living on their capital, and pretending that they were conducting the Service more economically? That is a very easy thing to do. If you receive £5,000, and spend £10,000, taking the other £5,000 from capital, it always leads to financial ruin, and I am not at all sure that if this policy be persisted in by the hon. Gentleman and right hon. Gentlemen opposite it will not also lead to ruin, for what applies to individual finance also applies to national finance. It really would appear that time was coming when their stores could not last any longer, and that they were obliged to spend this sum of money which they did not contemplate when the Estimates were brought in. If that is the explanation—I do not say it is—it is a very bad explanation.
1371 Surely, at the beginning of every financial year it is the duty of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty to see that his Votes are arranged in such a manner that they shall work out at something like the sum which he asks for. I have had the honour of sitting for five years on the Public Accounts Committee. I had the pleasure of sitting on that Committee at the same time as the hon. Gentleman the Member for Flintshire. I think he will bear me out when I say that the Members of that Committee in those days, irrespective of party, always said that the various Departments should endeavour to Budget correctly; that it was a very bad practice to have either surpluses or deficits in any large sums; that they ought not to have money over, because it showed that they did not know how much they were going to spend, and that they did not take proper care in the expenditure of the money. That is a very important point at the present moment, when we are face to face with the fact that we may have a diversion of the Old Sinking Fund. Even now, when the surpluses go to the Old Sinking Fund, we are liable to this very erroneous Budgeting. What will happen when they are taken and applied to all sorts of vote-catching objects which hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite might think to be advisable for the moment? I would ask the Financial Secretary one other question. It has been said that the surplus arising from the difference between the surpluses and the deficits—the net surplus—has been surrendered to the Exchequer. I do not find this on the Paper; there is nothing whatever about it, and the surplus in this case means £168,000 being surrendered to the Exchequer. I do not see anything about that at all, although, of course, it may be that it is an oversight. But I should like to know, because I see the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary for War in his place, and he has got a very large surplus of £618,000. The right hon. Gentleman has made enough soldiers, but I do not see on the Paper how that is dealt with. I should like to have a little information about it from the Financial Secretary. I have endeavoured to sum up what seems to me to be certain points which require explanation, and I shall be very much obliged if the hon. Gentleman will give me the information for which I ask.
§ Dr. MACNAMARAI do not quite appreciate the relevance of the comment of the hon. Baronet. Perhaps it is because I was not one of those who took part in the Debate on the historic occasion to which he referred. The hon. Baronet quite understands, I assume, that section 4, sub-section 1, of the Appropriation Act gives the Treasury power temporarily to sanction, in respect of the Navy and Army Votes, the application of the excess in any one Vote for the purpose of meeting a deficit in any other Vote. Of course, the total aggregate for the whole Services voted by the House is not to be exceeded. The fifth section of the Appropriation Act gives Parliamentary and permanent sanction to the sanction already temporarily vested in the Treasury. In 1907–8 the gross expenditure on the Navy Vote was £32,866,506 6s. 9d., under practically 17 different Votes—16 Votes really, one being the Shipbuilding Vote divided into three sections. I would call the attention of the hon. Baronet to the fact that these 17 Estimates range between £14,295 in one case, to as high as—dividing the Shipbuilding Votes into three parts, it would be very large if taken together—£7,783,000. These are the Estimates under these 17 Votes, made at least 18 months before the last expenditure will come into course of payment. The variations we show in connection with the Resolution moved by the Financial Secretary are in respect of seven Votes giving—with the amount written off as irrecoverable, of £3,547 odd—on the total amount of over £32,000,000, a total deficit of £720,472 5s. 6d. On the other hand, in respect of 10 Votes, there were surpluses amounting in all to £888,815 18s. 5d., that is, a net surplus over expenditure of £168,343 12s. 11d. The hon. Baronet says that is a pretty bad estimate, and he says it is so much worse for us because we were financial purists several years ago, and that we have no right to show these great variations and this large surplus On the question of surrender, obviously it has to be surrendered to the Treasury, so that he need have no anxiety about that. I will take a comparison with figures for some of the years in which it appears that Members of the party now in office made some comments about the discrepancy between actual expenditure and estimated expenditure. Take this year, 1907–8. The excess of actual gross expenditure over estimated gross expenditure was £818,647, or an excess of 2.49 per cent. In the par- 1373 ticular year in which, I understand, some of my hon. and right hon. Friends made some comment as to the variation between the estimate and expenditure, there was a Supplementary Estimate. The hon. Baronet said that seemed to be rather a poor defence. On the contrary, it is a very excellent defence, because by the Supplementary Estimate you wipe out of the account altogether what would otherwise appear to be a very large deficiency, and which would make a very considerable variation between the two figures. In the year 1903–4 there was a large Supplementary Estimate, amounting to one million and a quarter. If you add that million and a quarter to the estimated expenditure for that year, then the variation would be 4.40 per cent., as compared with 2.49 this year. Therefore this year does show a considerable advance towards financial purity in careful estimating compared with the year to which the hon. Baronet refers.
§ Mr. BONAR LAWDoes that include surpluses and deficiencies?
§ Dr. MACNAMARAIt is the excess of gross expenditure over gross estimate. I go further back, to the years in which there were no Supplementary Estimates. In 1905–6 the percentage was 72. There was a Supplementary Estimate that year, but as it is only for £100 it was of very small account. In the year 1899–1900 the excess of expenditure over estimated expenditure was 4.26 per cent., and in 1898–99 2.55 per cent. In 1897–8 2.72 per cent., and in the year under discussion 2.49, which is below those I have quoted.
§ Sir F. BANBURYWhat about deficits?
§ Dr. MACNAMARAI will take the total variations—that is to say, adding the total surplus and the total deficiency together. In this year the total variation is £1,609,288, in 1903–4 £1,750,000 (about). The amount on the actual Estimate was £493,231, and to that I add the Supplemental Estimate of about £1,250,000. In 1899–1900 £2,722,808, in 1898–9 £1,403,127, in 1897–8 £2,592,871. Therefore in previous years the variation is considerably more. The hon. Baronet asks me to explain the deficiency in Vote 1. It is set out on pages 22 and 23 of the Appropriation Account in the fullest possible detail, and no doubt the hon. Baronet has already read it. I may shortly say that the deficiency in Vote I was due to the average rate of pay of officers and men of the Fleet being higher than the rates1 provided for in the Estimates and to payment for allowances and 1374 extra pay being greater than was estimated in the Estimates which were made 18 months before. May I also point out that this Vote provides for 128,000 individuals. Then with regard to Vote 8 and the three sections of it. The hon. Baronet asks how can we account for the deficiency. May I call his attention to pages 40 to 46 of the Appropriation Account, where he will find the details fully given him? In Vote 8, section 1, the deficiency was due to magazine cooling apparatus, which were very urgent, and which we found necessary to supply to the ships, and also due to unexpected repairs to certain other ships. In section 2 the deficiency is due to increased requirements for materials for programme services and for stores for the maintenance of the Fleet. In section 3, Vote 8, the surplus is due to labour troubles at contractors' works and the making less progress on yard machinery than was expected; there was, however, the increased expenditure on armour for the "Bellerophon," the "Temeraire," and' the "Superb."
Having answered all these questions, may I call the attention of the hon. Baronet to the very able speech made last December by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire (Mr. Austen Chamberlain) on this1 very point of variation between actual expenditure and the actual estimate? He has been' a Civil Lord himself, and I listened to his speech with great pleasure, and with it I was entirely in accord. He pointed out that, say, take the Estimates for 1909–10, those had to be prepared in October last year, and they will not ultimately be closed as to expenditure until the last day of the next March but one. During that time there will be changes. For instance, contractors will not get as: much work done as was expected. There will be expenses of mishaps to ships, and various other matters will arise which make it quite safe for me to say that this amount of variation is very small. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire pointed out, if yon take away this power from the Treasury of giving temporary sanction for the transfer of excess at one point to meet a deficiency at another, we would be compelled in every one of those 17 Votes to vote what I would call the maximum figure in order that we might not be left in these vital and important services without money at a particular time. You would be bound to estimate at the top figure in each of those 17 Votes, and having estimated the 1375 probability is that you would spend the sum estimated. Therefore, I am bound to say that this power of temporary sanction given to the Treasury is in the interest of the truest economy, and I hope one that will not be departed from.
§ Sir F. BANBURYI was not objecting to the power given to the Treasury provided that it was used in a moderate manner. I do not take the ultra view that this power should not be granted, but my point is that it should be exercised in a moderate manner, and that more care should be taken in arriving at the actual sum likely to be spent. The hon. Gentleman says that I am wrong in stating that they over-estimated and under-estimated in a greater degree than their predecessors, because I had not taken into account the Supplementary Estimate. It is quite possible the hon. Gentleman himself may have a Supplementary Estimate.
§ Dr. MACNAMARANot in this year. This year is gone. We are dealing with 1907⤓8.
§ Sir F. BANBURYI admit the hon. Gentleman is correct, but in other years he may have. A Supplementary Estimate is not always the result of bad Budgetting. It may be that something arises which causes an increased expenditure, and a Supplementary Estimate may be absolutely necessary and right, and may be a very accurate estimate of the new expenditure which was not foreseen. At the present time there is a case in point. There is the provision of the four new "Dreadnoughts," for which there must be some new expenditure. Nobody can object to a Supplementary Estimate, for that, and it does not at all follow that because there is a Supplementary Estimate that the Budgetting was inaccurate. On the contrary it may have been that the exigencies of the Service demanded fresh expenditure, and that the Supplementary Estimate was necessary for that purpose. I find that in the year 1904, adding the surpluses and deficits, the total amount came to a little under a million, and this year it is £1,600,000, and in 1905 the total amount was £600,000 as against £1,600,000. Therefore the hon. Gentleman has shown no reason why the attention of the House should not be drawn to the increase in the Budgetting. The hon. Gentleman has not 1376 answered one of my questions. I asked whether this saving of stores was due to the expenditure of stores without replacing them. The hon. Gentleman said that they had trouble with the wages and the works, or something of that sort, and passed it over in that way. That was not my question. I wanted to know whether it was not the result of bad management in spending your stores from reserve and not replacing them? I find in the Navy Vote of 1906–7 the stores brought into stock without replacing them £1,0514,000, and in 1907–8 £1,294,000, or in two years about 2½ million pounds of stores were drawn from the reserves.
§ The CHAIRMANThis question really does not arise here.
§ Sir FREDERICK BANBURYPerhaps I was misled by having read the speeches of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite, who referred at great length to these various items. However. I have made my point, and I will not pursue the subject further.
§ Mr. A. C. MORTONI am glad that this matter has been raised, because it is an unfortunate fact that during the last two or three years there has been no opportunity of considering the economy of expenditure of public money. I do not deny that it may be necessary that some of these surpluses should be spent in the way indicated, but they are very often used for objects which have never been considered in Committee of Supply. That is contrary to our Constitution.
§ The CHAIRMANThe hon. Member appears to be discussing the law under which this is done. It is done according to law, but we have to sanction the transfer after it is made. The hon. Member is not in order in discussing the law or the practice itself.
§ Mr. MORTONWhat I am trying to discuss is the fact that this money is spent on objects which have never come before Committee of Supply. I have known the money to be recklessly spent on objects which would never have been sanctioned if we had had an opportunity of considering them in Committee of Supply.
§ The CHAIRMANThese matters are perfectly properly dealt with under the law; we have merely to give our sanction or refuse it.
§ Mr. MORTONI do not know how such matters can be brought before Committee of Supply unless we alter our constitutional practice. We do not know what a great deal of this expenditure is for. I used to take some interest in ascertaining how the money was spent; but, the present Government having left me off the Public Accounts Committee, I cannot get the information for the benefit of the country. Great care ought to be taken over this matter, and the money should not be applied to objects which we have not had an opportunity of considering. I wish particularly to enter my strong protest against our not being allowed to con
§ sider the economy of expenditure of public money.
§ Mr. GEORGE RENWICKMay I ask the Secretary to the Admiralty to explain the very large surpluses on Votes 9 and 10? An item of £241,905 is given under the heading "Naval Armaments," and another of £304,827 under the heading of "Works, Buildings, and Repairs, at home and abroad." Sums ought not to be lumped together in this way, and I hope some further explanation will be given.
§ Question put, "That the application of such sums be sanctioned."
§ The Committee divided: Ayes, 167; Noes, 38.
1379| Division No. 375.] | AYES. | [4.37 p.m. |
| Acland, Francis Dyke | Griffith, Ellis J. | Partington, Oswald |
| Alden, Percy | Gulland, John W. | Paulton, James Mellor |
| Asquith, Rt. Hon. Herbert Henry | Haldane, Rt. Hon. Richard B. | Pickersgill, Edward Hare |
| Astbury, Thomas Heir | Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale) | Pirie, Duncan V. |
| Atherley-Jones, L | Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose) | Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H. |
| Barnes, G. N. | Hardy, George A. (Suffolk) | Priestley, Sir W. E. B. (Bradford, E.) |
| Barran, Rowland Hirst | Hart-Davies, T. | Radford, G. H. |
| Beale, W. P. | Hazel, Dr. A. E. W. | Rea, Rt. Hon. Russell (Gloucester) |
| Beauchamp, E. | Hedges, A. Paget | Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough) |
| Beck, A. Cecil | Henderson, Arthur (Durham) | Richardson, A. |
| Bellairs, Carlyon | Herbert, Col. Sir Ivor (Mon., S.) | Roberts, G. H. (Norwich) |
| Benn, W. (Tower Hamlets, St. Geo.) | Herbert, T. Arnold (Wycombe) | Robertson, Sir G. Scott (Bradford) |
| Bethell, T. R. (Essex, Maldon) | Higham, John Sharp | Robson, Sir William Snowdon |
| Bowerman, C. W. | Hobart, Sir Robert | Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke) |
| Brace, William | Hobhouse, Rt. Hon. Charles E. H. | Rogers, F. E. Newman |
| Brigg, John | Hooper, A. G. | Rose, Sir Charles Day |
| Brocklehurst, W. B. | Horniman, Emslie John | Rowlands, J. |
| Brooke, Stopford | Howard, Hon. Geoffrey | Rutherford, V. H. (Brentford) |
| Brunner, Rt. Hon. Sir J. T. (Cheshire) | Hudson, Walter | Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland) |
| Bryce, J. Annan | Idris, T. H. W. | Schwann, C. Duncan (Hyde) |
| Burns, Rt. Hon. John | Illingworth, Percy H. | Schwann, Sir C. E. (Manchester) |
| Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas | Jones, Sir D. Brynmor (Swansea) | Scott, A. H. (Ashton-under-Lyne) |
| Byles, William Pollard | Jones, William (Carnarvonshire) | Silcock, Thomas Ball |
| Carr-Gomm, H. W. | Jowett, F. W. | Soames, Arthur Wellesley |
| Cherry, Right Hon. R. R. | Kekewich, Sir George | Soares, Ernest J. |
| Clough, William | Kelley, George D. | Steadman, W. C. |
| Cobbold, Felix Thornley | King, Alfred John (Knutsford) | Strachey, Sir Edward |
| Collins, Stephen (Lambeth) | Laidlaw, Robert | Summerbell, T. |
| Corbett, C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead) | Lamont, Norman | Sutherland, J. E. |
| Cotton, Sir H. J. S. | Lehmann, R. C. | Tennant, Sir Edward (Salisbury) |
| Cox, Harold | Lever, A. Levy (Essex, Harwich) | Tennant, H. J. (Berwickshire) |
| Craig, Herbert J. (Tynemouth) | Lewis, John Herbert | Thomas, Sir A. (Glamorgan, E.) |
| Crooks, William | Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas | Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton) |
| Cross, Alexander | Luttrell, Hugh Fownes | Tomkinson, James |
| Crossley, William J. | Lyell, Charles Henry | Verney, F. W. |
| Curran, Peter Francis | Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester) | Vivian, Henry |
| Dalziel, Sir James Henry | Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs) | Walton, Joseph |
| Dewar, Arthur (Edinburgh, S.) | Maclean, Donald | Ward, John (Stoke-upon-Trent) |
| Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness) | Macnamara, Dr. Thomas J. | Wardle, George J. |
| Dunne, Major E. Martin (Walsall) | M'Callum, John M. | Warner, Thomas Courtenay E. |
| Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor) | McKenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald | Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan) |
| Esslemont, George Birnie | M'Micking, Major G. | Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney) |
| Everett, R. Lacey | Maddison, Frederick | Watt, Henry A. |
| Faber, G. H. (Boston) | Mallet, Charles E. | White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire) |
| Falconer, James | Marks, G. Croydon (Launceston) | Whitley, John Henry (Halifax) |
| Fenwick, Charles | Marnham, F. J. | Wiles, Thomas |
| Fiennes, Hon. Eustace | Massie, J. | Wilkie, Alexander |
| Finday, Alexander | Masterman, C. F. G. | Wilson, Hon. G. G. (Hull, W.) |
| Foster, Rt. Hon. Sir Walter | Menzies, Sir Walter | Wilson, Henry J. (York, W.R.) |
| Fuller, John Michael F. | Mond, A. | Wilson, John (Durham, Mid) |
| Gibb, James (Harrow) | Morgan, G. Hay (Cornwall) | Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton) |
| Gill, A. H. | Morse, L. L. | Wood, T. M'Kinnon |
| Gladstone, Rt. Hon. Herbert John | Morton, Alpheus Cleophas | Yoxall, Sir James Henry |
| Glen-Coats, Sir T. (Renfrew, W.) | Murray, Capt. Hon. A. C. (Kincard) | |
| Goddard, Sir Daniel Ford | Napier, T. B. | TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. Joseph Pease and Captain Norton. |
| Gooch, George Peabody (Bath) | O'Donnell, C. J. (Walworth) | |
| Greenwood, G. (Peterborough) | Parker, James (Halifax) | |
| NOES. | ||
| Acland-Hood, Rt. Hon. Sir Alex. F. | Gooch, Henry Cubitt (Peckham) | Powell, Sir Francis Sharp |
| Arkwright, John Stanhope | Guinness, Hon. W. E. (Bury St. Ed.) | Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel |
| Balcarres, Lord | Harris, Frederick Leverton | Renwick, George |
| Bridgeman, W. Clive | Heaton, John Henniker | Ropner, Colonel Sir Robert |
| Campbell, Rt. Hon. J. H. M. | Hermon-Hodge, Sir Robert T. | Sloan, Thomas Henry |
| Carlile, E. Hildred | Hunt, Rowland | Stone, Sir Benjamin |
| Cecil, Evelyn (Aston Manor) | Lambton, Hon. Frederick William | Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester) |
| Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry | Law, Andrew Bonar (Dulwich) | Thomson, W. Mitchell- (Lanark) |
| Courthope, G. Loyd | Long, Col. Charles W. (Evesham) | Tuke, Sir John Batty |
| Craik, Sir Henry | Long, Rt. Hon. Walter (Dublin, S.) | Valentia, Viscount |
| Doughty, Sir George | Lyttelton, Rt. Hon. Alfred | |
| Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers- | M'Arthur, Charles | TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Sir F. Banbury and Mr. Ashley. |
| Duncan, Robert (Lanark, Govan) | Morpeth, Viscount | |
| Fell, Arthur | Pease, Herbert Pike (Darlington) |
Bill read the third time, and passed.
§ Mr. HOBHOUSE moved:—
§ II. Whereas it appears by the Army Appropriation Account for the year ended 31st day of March, 1908, and the statement appended thereto, that the aggregate expenditure on Army Services has not exceeded the aggregate sums appropriated for those Services, but that, as shown in the schedule hereto appended, the total differences between the Exchequer Grants for Army Services and the net expenditure are as follows, viz.:—
| SCHEDULE. | |||||||
| Number of Vote. | Army Services, 1907–8.—Votes. | Differences between Exchequer Grants and Net Expenditure. | |||||
| Surpluses. | Deficits. | ||||||
| £ | s. | d. | £ | s. | d. | ||
| 1 | Pay, &c., of Army | 138,765 | 3 | 3 | — | ||
| 2 | Medical Establishment: Pay, &c | 19,313 | 17 | 3 | — | ||
| 3 | Militia: Pay, Bounty, &c. | 112,056 | 16 | 11 | — | ||
| 4 | Imperial Yeomanry: Pay and Allowances | 2,891 | 17 | 8 | — | ||
| 5 | Volunteer Corps: Pay and Allowances | 22,949 | 4 | 10 | — | ||
| 6 | Quarterings, Transport and Remounts | 76,444 | 16 | 3 | — | ||
| 7 | Supplies and Clothing | 115,269 | 0 | 5 | — | ||
| 8 | Ordnance Department Establishments and General Stores | 101,021 | 2 | 5 | — | ||
| 9 | Armaments and Engineer Stores | — | 12,866 | 7 | 2 | ||
| 10 | Works and Buildings | 84,225 | 5 | 9 | — | ||
| 11 | Establishments for Military Education | — | 780 | 13 | 8 | ||
| 12 | Miscellaneous Effective Services | — | 697 | 4 | 0 | ||
| 13 | War Office and Army Accounts Department | 3,041 | 5 | 1 | — | ||
| 14 | Non-effective Charges for Officers, &c. | 10,828 | 4 | 9 | — | ||
| 15 | Non-effective Charges for Men, &c. | — | 47,178 | 5 | 1 | ||
| 16 | Civil Superannuation, Compensation, Compassionate Allowances, and Gratuities | 471 | 19 | 2 | — | ||
| — | Balances irrecoverable and Claims abandoned | — | 7,298 | 3 | 11 | ||
| Total | 687,278 | 13 | 9 | 68,820 | 13 | 10 | |
| Net Surplus | £618,457 19 11 |
§ Question proposed, "That the application of such sums be sanctioned."
1380| £ | s. | d. | |||
| Total surpluses | … | … | 687,278 | 13 | 9 |
| Total deficits | … | … | 68,820 | 13 | 10 |
| Net surplus | … | … | £618,457 | 19 | 11 |
§ And whereas the Lords Commissioners of His Majesty's Treasury have temporarily authorised the application of so much of the said total surpluses on certain Grants for Army Services as is necessary to make good the said total deficits on other Grants for Army Services.
§ Resolutions to be reported to-morrow.