18. Mr. MacCALLUM SCOTTasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that the net result of the retrenchments effected by the Treasury in the Estimates for the current year in the three Classes II. (Salaries and Expenses of Civil Departments), III. (Law and Justice), and IV. (Education, Science and Art), is that the expenditure on purely local services in England, eliminating United Kingdom services, has been increased by £408,497; that expenditure on Irish services has been increased by £215,296, while the expenditure on Scottish services has been decreased by £141,569; and whether he proposes to take any steps to secure an approximately equal distribution of retrenchment due to the War upon the services of England, Ireland, and Scotland?
§ Mr. ACLANDI find some difficulty in following my hon. Friend's figures, which, even within the classes enumerated by him, appear to put the increase of Irish expenditure some £50,000 higher than is shown in the Estimates, and to treat as wholly English the provision of £145,000 for war losses of universities, etc., of which a considerable part will be applicable to Scotland. The figures are further invalidated by the fact that they cover only part of the total civil expenditure of the year. The reduction in Scottish expenditure to which my hon. Friend refers would be more than accounted for by the reduction in the Agriculture (Scotland) Fund, and I should have been glad to direct similar reductions in money to be spent in the other constituent parts of the United Kingdom had there been any similar fund in England or Ireland with a large balance. Economies are effected wherever opportunity presents itself without regard to the particular part of the country affected, a principle which, to my mind, needs no apology.
Mr. MacCALLUM SCOTTDoes the hon. Gentleman agree with the statement that the net result of the economies effected has been to increase the expenditure on local services in England and Ireland and to decrease the expenditure on local services in Scotland?
§ Mr. ACLANDYes. That is largely because local services happen to be paid for in Scotland out of taxes which in England are paid out of rates.