Lords Sitting of 10 July 1822

CORN IMPORTATION BILL.
On the order of the day for the third reading of this bill,
The Earl of Lauderdalesaid, he wished their lordships to pause before they passed a measure of so much importance. He took a view of the operation of the existing act, and contended that instead of providing a minimum protection price, it had established a maximum. He complained of the inconsistency of the noble lords opposite in now turning against their own measure, and read a passage from a speech of the earl of Liverpool, in which the noble earl expressed an opinion, that the Corn bill having passed, no alteration ought to be made in the system. In this opinion he also coincided, and therefore could not give his support to the present measure. He objected particularly to the time at which it was proposed, and thought it would be injurious to legislate prospectively. He would therefore move, "That the bill be read a third time this day three months."
The Earl of Harrowbyconceived, that be was giving more effect to the existing act, by remedying the defects which it contained, and vindicated ministers from the charge of having abandoned the principles which they had formerly professed. It was better to legislate now, than to wait till prices should rise, and the public mind grow full of anxiety and alarm. He contended, that the bill would prove advantageous to the British farmer, by preventing unlimited importation whenever corn should rise above the protection price. He was not one of those who wished that the price of corn should reach 80 s., for it would produce a corresponding rise in the price of provisions; and as all evils were attended with some compensation, so the present low price of provisions had proved beneficial to our manufactures.
Lord Erskinesaid, it was cruel to tarn upon the agriculturists, and tell them that they had not suffered from the change in the currency, and that they would be as well protected with 70 s. as they had been with 80 s.
Earl Grosvenorsaid, that when he found the bill petitioned against by the whole agricultural body, he could not consider

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it as a measure of relief to them. He thought it was favourable to every other interest, save that of agriculture. There was no necessity whatever for legislating at present upon the subject. Why, therefore, should there be any objection to delay?
Lord Redesdalemaintained, that every bill founded on the principle of averages was founded on a wrong principle, as the average prices returned were not the true prices. But even if those prices were correct, he should object to the time at which the present bill was brought in. He should prefer throwing the ports open to the importation of foreign corn, with such a duty as would enable the British farmer to meet it in the market.
The Earl of Carnarvoncontended, that a great protecting duty was necessary, in consequence of the alteration in prices produced by the change in the currency. He thought the present bill preferable to the act already in existence, though both were founded on erroneous data.
The. House divided: Contents, 32; Not-contents, 16. The bill was then passed.

PROTESTS AGAINST THE CORN IMPORTATION BILL.
The following Protests were entered on the Journals:
"Dissentient:—Because this bill repeals the regulations as enacted by the 55th of George 3rd, chapter 26, whereby, after long and minute examination into the state of the b agriculture of the United Kingdom, it was by Parliament provided, as necessary to afford to agriculture a degree of protection equal to what the law gives to other branches of industry, that wheat from abroad should not be exposed to sale till the price in our markets amounted to 80 s.; and at a time when it is admitted that foreign wheat can be imported at 35 s. a quarter, it enacts that the foreign grower shall in future be admitted to a competition with our farmers when wheat is at 70 s. a quarter, on paying a duty of 17 s. for the first three months, and afterwards of 12 s. till it rises to 80 s.
"Under this bill, therefore, the farmer will not only be deprived of the monopoly he enjoyed in the home market, till wheat attained the price of 80 s. the quarter, but he will be exposed when it is at 70 s. to a competition with the foreign grower, whose wheat, value 35 s., may, on paying the duty of 17 s., be brought into our market at 52 s. per quarter, and after the ports have
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been open for three months may be sold at 47 s., as it will then only bear a duty of 12 s.
"That these regulations are ruinous, to the agricultural interest cannot be doubted. The petitions on the table of this House, in the strongest terms deprecating the proposed alteration in the law, sufficiently display the opinion of those whose habits give them practical know ledge on the subject; whilst the committee themselves, from whom the proposal emanated, by disclaiming all intention of rendering worse the present condition of the British cultivation, and proposing, as the bill enacts, that the 55th of the late king should remain in force till wheat rises to 80 s. a quarter, have clearly avowed their opinion that the bill, when it takes effect, must prose injurious to the agricultural interest.
"It is to me, therefore, a subject of deep regret, when the distress of the British cultivator is so feelingly described in the numerous petitions on our table, that this House should enact a regulation which, though it is only to take place at a future period, cannot but produce immediate discontent: for to me it appears that every sense of political discretion, and every feeling that actuates a generous mind, must unite in pointing out, that the moment in which the legislature is unwillingly compelled to avow its incapacity to devise any means of present relief for the distressed farmer, is the time of all others in which it ought to avoid announcing a future injury to his despairing mind. LAUDERDALE."
"DISSENTIENT:—Because the act of the 55th of the late king, chapter 26, which is partially repealed by this bill, was brought into parliament by his majesty's ministers to remove the admitted impolicy of unlimited importations of foreign grain; and 80 s. per quarter for our own wheat (and other grain in proportion) was with the greatest deliberation adopted as the lowest price in our markets under which, therefore, it was enacted that our ports should be shut.
"Because, from an obvious defect in that act, whenever wheat in out markets rose to 80 s. per quarter (other grain in proportion). Importation was left free and unlimited, by which the protecting standard immediately ceased to be protective; as foreign wheat might then generally, as now, be imported at about 32 s. per quar-

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ter, and to any extent; thereby manifestly enabling jobbers and speculators to undersell British growers, weighed down since the late war with a pressure of taxation never before known or heard of in the world.
"Because, this defect in the act of the 55th of the late king soon became the subject of universal complaint, three millions and a half quarters of foreign grain having come free into our ports, and at very low prices, before their being shut in February, 1819, to the great depression of our markets ever since.
"Because the prices of grain from this and other causes having ceased to be remunerative, many petitions were presented to his majesty's ministers, and to both House of Parliament, praying for relief in this respect; and thereupon a committee was appointed to consider the justice of their complaints.
"Because such committee, as appears by its report in a former session of parliament, having pronounced that agriculturists of every description were consuming their capitals without any present or expected returns which could be remunerative, the House of Commons directed its inquiries to be renewed in the present session, for the express and only purpose of originating some further relief from the ruinous depression of our markets.
"Because the House of Commons, therefore, in the consideration of this subject, had, no other duty cast upon it by the whole course of its own proceedings but to attend impartially to the universal complaints throughout the country, which unanimously attributed the distresses to the undue and impolitic opening of the ports under the existing law, without a reasonable and fixed protecting duty, not liable to be defeated by fraudulent averages, nor disturbed by perpetual fluctuations, when the ports were open or shut at the adopted standard.
"Because, it was therefore with equal surprise and regret that I read this bill when it was brought before us, which ought to have been instantly rejected, since it passes by altogether the complaints of the petitioners, which its authors have professed all along to act upon and to relieve; and although the superabundance of supplies over the demands on our markets had been declared by his majesty's ministers to be the grievances, yet this bill unaccountably adds to them,
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without measure or mercy, by leaving the ports open at 70 s., though before shut until 80 s., and by letting loose the bonded grain at the lower standard though now in the country to a great amount, and without any protecting duty; because, when it is notorious that foreign wheat (other grain in proportion) may be generally imported at about 35 s. per quarter, a duty 17 s., which, when added, amounts to 52 s. only, cannot in common sense or common honesty, be considered as any security to the British grower.
"Because, to insist never the less that this injurious change in the existing law is a great advantage to those whom it professes to relieve, though against their own universal voice, as expressed without a single exception by all the petitions, upon our table, is to maintain an opinion, which, however honestly and ably supported, may be considered by the sufferers to be as unfounded as it appears to me to be absurd.
"Because, from the great preponderance in the representation of other classes over the landed interest in the House of Commons, the petitioners who have laid their calamitous condition before us naturally looked up to this House for constitutional support. The Statute book is filled with almost innumerable acts for the protection of our manufactures and commerce by duties and prohibitions, whilst the security of landed property has been wholly neglected. Indeed, when I contemplate this sudden invasion of the 55th of the late king, at the very moment when its protecting provisions ought manifestly to have been extended, it seems to me as if a course of experiments was on foot by philosophical theorists to ascertain under what accumulated pressure of unequal taxation, and unequal competition with untaxed countries, the impoverished cultivators of our soil can possibly continue to exist. ERSKINE."