MEDICINE DUTIES. (Hansard, 29 September 1915)

§ Mr. McKENNA
I beg to move, "That the words, 'twenty-ninth day of September' ["That the Excise Duties now payable on medicines shall on and after the twenty-ninth day of September"] be left out, and the words 'twentieth day of October' be inserted instead thereof."
It was represented to the Treasury and to the Customs Department that there would be very grave and, in fact, insuperable difficulties in restamping large quantities of patent medicines which had already been stamped, and that reasonable time must be given to the trade to enable them to conform with the law. In view of those representations, which we were quite satisfied were fair, reasonable, and honest representations, we ask the House to postpone the operation of the Resolution on the tax from the 29th September to 20th October. I believe, in addition to this concession, that as a matter of practice we shall have to admit of the use of an ordinary postage stamp, properly cancelled, instead of the large special stamp which is usually affixed to patent medicine bottles, but that is a mere matter of machinery for which no Parliamentary authority is necessary.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the words 'twenty-ninth day of September' ["on the first sale on or after the twenty-ninth day of September"] be left out, and the words 'twentieth day of October' be inserted instead thereof."—[Mr. McKenna.]

Sir H. DALZIEL
Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether the dates he suggests are the dates suggested by the deputation and satisfy the trade?

§ Mr. McKENNA
I understand so. I understand that they satisfy both the Customs Department and the trade.

§ Mr. GLYN-JONES
The trade is very grateful to the Chancellor of the Exchequer for this extension of time. It would have been, as he says, absolutely impossible for them to have prepared their stocks by to-day, and the small stamp, which I understand he has promised to provide will also enable them quite definitely to have their goods ready for legal sale by the 20th day of October. There is one other matter which I should like to press upon the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The trade also made a further suggestion about the alteration of the scale. There has really been no time between the receipt of the deputation by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and today for him to have fully considered what they had to say about the scale on which the duty is based, but I ask him before the Finance Act is drafted to be good enough to carefully consider the proposals which they made, not to modify the stamps, but the values which the stamps are to carry.