§ To this sum must be added the arrears brought forward from last year—£30,046,000—giving a total revenue of £199,791,000. That leaves a surplus of £861,000.
§ I have one word to say about that surplus and about its character before I come to consider the question of what the Government propose should be done with it. It may be said that this is a surplus due to the carrying forward from last year of £2,900,000, which is attributable to the raiding of the Sinking Fund; but I think I should point out that had the Budget 1137 passed in the ordinary course last year, we would have received in respect of the revenue of the year £2,000,000 more from the ordinary Income Tax, another £1,000,000 from the Super-tax, £150,000 from stamps, and £200,000 from land, or a total of £3,350,000; so that, even if this Budget were introduced now without any arrears from last year and had things taken their normal course, instead of a surplus of £861,000 we should have had a surplus of £1,238,000, just enough to finance the insurance schemes of the Government for the first quarter of the calendar year. Of course, if things had gone on in their normal course £2,900,000 would have been disposed of last year, which is now carried forward into this year, and we should not have had the benefit of that £2,973,000; we should have had the benefit of the increased revenue of £3,350,000, so that we should have been better off by £377,000.
§ The question is, What are we to do with the surplus?