Star. — London, England, 1816-03-29 00:00:00

• . mitree. Mr. LYTTELTON said, that in the absence, of his Noble Friend and ,colleague (Lord Elmler) he should be under the necessity of noticing a proceed ing which had taken place i on the preceding day. His Noble Friend had preseutTd a Petition from Worces• tershire, which was ordered to be referred to the pre sent Committee ; it was presented at a time when there were very few Members in the House, and the Noble Lord did not enter into a full statement of its contents. He shou!d now, however, procure a hear in;r, for that petition ; it could not be the wish of the Noble Lord to stifle tl:e sentiments which it contained. It was Gr, however, that the House should hear what the petitioners had stated, and for that purpose he moved that it should be read. The Petition was read accrOingly. The petitioners deprecated the erec tion of all new and expensive public works, .the ar r:.‘rs of the Civil List, together with all kinds of tiotti.cessary ispendititre, and prayed that a general syvm of economy might be established throughout .the country. Mr. WESTERN then addressed the Committee. He hoped they would tate into consideration the .difficuui.s under which the country now laboured, and that the; would receive several important com;" munications from Gentlemen present, as he conceived that such c'mmunicatiuns would give a clear idea of the extent of the distress prevailing in the country. From all the knowledge he had on the subject, it ap peared to him that the nation was now in an unheard of state of distress. At the same time, he was far from entertaining any thing like a despeiriag view of our situation. It must however be known, that the land paid no rent ; that the wages of the labourer ' were not sutcient to procure him sustenance, alai that the stock in the hands of agriculturists was turned into a real loss. Could any man then view such a situatimens this without lecling something like despondency. and without extreme alarm for the cntesequences It was from the rent of land and from the wages of labourers that all revenue was ul timately derived; but such was the present situation, that the land was not equal to the production of re venue, and therefore it was the duty of the House to consider what was to be Icolced for, and to devise means that shotild restore prosperity to the country. It was the business of the Committee to see what was the cause of the distresses to which he alludcd. He would answer the question, and say, that these dis tresses arose within the last two yea's from a fall in the profits of lam!, and, from a surplus of agricultu tura' products, the 'demand for them. It was a fact clearly demonstrable, that a very small surplus be yond the demand would at any time diminish the price of agricoltural produce. This was the pri. mary cause of low prices ; it was a fall in the real value of all the products of land. To this might be added a fail in the nominal v.iloe, ill consequence of the disappearance of the credit currency. All this had the effect of altering the property of individuals; it made a complete alteration in the distiibuilon of property throughout the country. The owners of agr cultural products at this time received only about half the amount they„forn.erly did, while they were obliged to pay the same sums in taxes which they had paid at a time when their produce fetched a price double the atneunt of what could now be Obtained for it. By this means the weight ci all the taxes and the natiurul debt was doubled. Some years ago, when the prices of all foods of provisions were high, every thing was on a fair level : the annuitants, and others with fixed incomes, were indeed distressed ; but then every thing had its value. The case was now entirely reirerbei ; and the parties were placed in a situation diametrically the reverse of what they had been in before, in consequence of the diminution of the circulating medium, and the Oepreciation of e l ys t t. The original cause was a great fall in the real value of the profits on land ; and that fall was owing, to a surplus produce beyond the demand: The first thing, therefore, which he should recommend would be, to take off that surplus by some means or other. As he had sufficiently explained his views upon the subject, he should not at present trouble the Corn mittse• with any more observations upon the general ptiuciples of the question. A few words, hnnever, were necessary before he sat down, upon the Resolu tion respecting the duties on malt, beer, and spirits. In his opinion, it would be proper that a Oonsitlerabie reduction should be made in the duties on spiries.— , This was a part of the question, however, which he did not think it incumbent upon himself to urge ; but if he thought that those duties were intended to be continued in their present state, be would give the Ccminittee his real opinion, which was, that they could not possibly continue with advantage to the revenue as they had been in a period of warfare.— The means of promoting illicit distillation, and the smuggling consequent upon it, were increased by the country's being in a state of peace, and by various other concurrent circumstances, and not all ',the powers of Government, great as they were, could Erevent the extension of the practice of L:siuggling to such a degree, that as much, if not more, would be lost by the crop oyment of means• for its prevention than would be saved by the revenue from the conti nuance of the duties in their former state. If the Right Hot ourable Gentleman thought that be could continue tf Use duties with advantage ; he was willing, however, to bear his arguments upon the subject, but he did not himself suppose mat the country could bear them; If the House would take the two, or three, or four years when the aggregate duties on spirits in Scotland amounted to £740,000. and when the duty was only ss. per gallon, and compare them with the years when the dirty •was Bs. per gallon, they would find the duties at ss. amount to much more than those at Bs. for time latter was only 4710,900, or 4712,000. In short, be did not believe tltat the Right Honourable Gentleman could receive any great additional revenue from the war duties, nor did he think they timid be at all paid by the people, and be wished it 10 be observed, that he did not so much complain of the duties themselves as that they could not be borne: He thought that great benefit woold be perceived, if ,it should be permitted to bond B r itish spirits. and be could see no great reason why B r itish spirits shoold not be bonded as well as the produce of foreign countries, and if it could be effec ted without duties, it would be very beneficial to the agricultural interests as well as the country at large. The stock of spirits would be greatly improved, and the quantities on hand would answer every purpose of granaries When the distillers would not come Seto si k e , m arkst. He should not detain the teausittre I ' longer at present, but shoal& conclude by moving** first Redolatiort as a kind of foundation for a general debate; for he would remind the House that the Re-, solution bad beets already agreed to. The Honour able Member then proposed the first resolution, which we have already published. Lord CASTLEREAGH thought it woull be much better if some practical proposition should be laid before the House as the foundation of a debate. He did not think it was necessary to take the sense of the House upon it, but that it might be read without any particular object but as the nominal ground of what might follow in the discussion. The H unse was always open to the reception of any modified proposition on the subject, and he thou?, that the Hots. Gentleman could have little or no objection to his suggestion. Mr. WESTERN then withdrew the first Resolu tion, which stated only generally the distress si4 the agricultural interest, and proposed the fourth, the substance of which was, that the demand for barley has been considerably reduced by the great duties to Which it was liable in the various operations to which it wersublested by the consumer, • 'Pine-Risolutieu having been read from the Chair, Mr. BRAND said, he should not detabt the Com mittee long by the few observations it was his' inten don to submit, for he thought that the Resolutions were so simple, and the conclusions consequent upon them so easily drawn, that he might state every thing he had to say very shortly. He should not enlarge upon what had already been sufficiently made known to the House—the general distress of the country, butt lie thought that Ministers had not been aware of the alarming extent which the public calamity had reached. The great distress had penetrated into every class of society, but none of the orders excited so much sympathy in their sufferings as the poorer and more helpless pan of the people, from whop nothing could be taken without adding to their dis tress in a manner intolerable to bear or to behold by those whose feelings were easily touched by the miseries of the unfortunate. He had last year expressed his opinion upon the state of the agricul ture when the House was considering a question in which the feelings and understanding of its Members were particularly interested, and it there was any Gentloian present who recollected the sentiments lie had den expressed, he would allow that what he had then said as prophetic, had since completely come to pass. He had then said, and he still beld'the same opinion. that in proportion as the distress of the oc cupier was increased, do would the distress of the, labourer be augmented; and this had evidently proved too true, when the agriculture was suspended, and relief for a time prevented by the circumstances of the countty. Time were Many cases of distress which had occurred, the relation of which he was sure would affect every well-constituted and benevolent mind. With the permission of the Finuse he shculd read an ettract of a letter from eambrid g esbire, and not from the upland part of that county, which might be expected to feel the general depression more forcibly, but from that part which had formeily been the most flourishing, from a parish indzed which had been most optilent, and which had every sign of a long continuance of its agricultural prosperity.— [The Hon. Member then read an extract from a let ter from a very respectable M. 'istrate ,, in Cambridge shire. in which it was stated, that the strongest and most able single men were paid for their labnnr at the cote of Bd. per day.]—Tl.us the most industrious people, and those who could once have earned them , selves a comfortable livelihood, could tow scarcely procure themselves a scanty subsistence to keep them from utter starvation. But he had expected worse instances of distress even than these, and more aggro ' vated cases had occurred. He had heard and he had personally witnessed some cases of extreme difficulty and accumulated wretckedness which he could sc trcely take upon himself to describe s and some of these had happened upon land which was very fertile ' and Very couvertible, and the Honourable Mover would perceive that such land was the least likely to suffer under a severe pressure. Before he left the country, a respectable fat mer had called upon him from a parish in a part of the country which in the , time of Camden, was considered and called the gar.' den of England; in that parish he was the only re maining occupier, and consequently his land became chargeable with the whole of the parish poor-rates. He tried, but without effect, to procure relief from the unoccupied land. Upon his inquiring what would become of the poor on his leaving his land, he was informed that they would become chargeable upon the next parish, which though the land in it was not so good as the former, was in a very diss tressed situation. The immense horde of paupers thus spreading and growing as it proceeded, was an evil which was adding daily to the numerous calami. ties already inflicted on the country; and if some early measure was not adopted for general relief; if some amendments were not speedily made to the Poor Laws, and if these unprovided paupers spread as they were at present legally authorised to de, the country would be plunged into a situation for which no remedy could be procured that would accomplish its salvation. it was necessary in taking a view of this question, bowever, that might benefit the coun try, to examine into causes before the House consi dered effects. The principal cause he believed was ' this—that the price of produce was not adequate to afford a profit, or even to cover the charges at which it might be raised. This was the great cause, without ' any quotations from works of political economy ; iti was a poetical and a too really existing troth. The difficulties were increasing, and the agricultural tress was gradually proceeding, and slowly destroy ing the means of the country ; but became the pros gress was slow and secret, the present Committee 'should nut consider it less sure. The capital which had been employed in agriculture was wasting and disappearing, and the absolute loss to die country front the distresses of the landed proprietors and occupiers, had been calculated at alop,oucooo, and even though he believed that to be an exaggerated statement, he considered the loss as almost beyond calculation, above the profit. He should not say that there was much injury done to the disunity by levy-, invests, or rents, by processes, if he did not vecol.' lees the ruinous consequences of these expedients . tor the collection of money. The great question to be considered was, how the landed interest was to be relieved For the discovery of a solution to this question, the Honourable Mover had proposed a number of Resolutions, which embraced trip leading . , 1, , • • measures: er ore, the relief of the land from. heavy charges, and the other, the raising of the price of pro duce so as to meet the expense of labour and culti vation'. There were numerous charges upon the landed interest, and none, he would, venture to say, was more generally complained of or more generally felt than the tithes. This was a subject which had long engaged his attention, and though he did not wish to press it particularly upon the House at pre sent, he hoped to see some new regulations respecting them at some future period. He had understood, and he hoped the Right Hon. Gentleman Would in form him if he was correct, that Mr. Pitt had intended to relieve the farming interests almost altogether from that part of the tithing system which was most oppressive, and that he had postponed the farther consideration of this subject till he had succeeded in his plans with regard to the redemption of the Land 'ax. This, was said to have been his reason for drop ping a measure which would have been very beneficial to the agriculture as well as to the country at large. And so great a benefit as it appeared to be, he did not think that it would be very difficult to carry a mea sure which might effectually relieve the farmers, by procuring a substitute. Various methods had been proposed of finding substitutes for the tithes.— That ohe which he'd been propcced of a commuta tion of lands, was not to be thought badly of, as be had no doubt but it would be found much less op pressive than the tithing system. Another plan of collecting corn rents had been suggested, which was much less generally disagreeable than the method in which the tithes were levied. These rents hethought it much better to have made payable upon the pro prietors. He should not, however, enter at present at great length upon this most important subject, be cause, as tie said before, he hoped to have another op. portunity of considering it. The time when tithes were most oppressive was, when a large capital was thrown into land ; but now it was taken out of land to be employed in every other possible manner ; in deed he did not think that they would be so grie vously felt at the present time as they had been felt for any part of the last ten years. But a great ques tion which he had, indeed, before hinted at, and the thorotrat: consideration of which might relieve the agriculture as much as any other measure that it was possible to propose, was the poor-rates. When the vast weight was contemplated, which the great mass of population called the poor composed, upon the landed interest, and when it was recollected that they were principally supported by the land, an easy re medy presented itself to the agriculture, that of making other interests and other bodies of the people contribute to the support of their fellow creatures.— If the present system was pursued, however, he be. lieved that the agriculture of the country would be utterly ruined and subverted. He had considared ,as well as he had been able, the distressed state of the kingdom, and if he had wanted any information cm the subject, the Hon. Member who had moved for the Committee had amply supplied the deficiency.— The alterations which be thought would be most expedient in the l'ocr Laws Would be, to limit the maims by the age of the claimant, and to make some considerable distinction between the treat ment of the orphan who could labour, and the Aged, who were unable to mike any great cxettious.— He should likewise think it necessary to make a difference between those whose poverty had been the consequence of their vices, and thase who had owed it to their midortunes, though industrious.- -The Resolutions of the Honourable Member were principally for the removal of charges and the in creasing the price of produce, as he had before stated, though there were some which were calzolatA to en force both those remedies. The fOurth, fifth, aad sixth were of that nature. After having gone thieugh the chief measures of proposed relict, he came to a great alleviation of distress, which 012 Minister him self had made. He alluded to the discontinuance of the Malt Duty, which hid been so considerable a re lief to the farmers, that he would venture to say that a person who had 400 acres of arable land would feel much lighter by its discontinuance than by the aboli tion of the. Property Tax. The country, he was sure, was grateful for this voluntary concurrence of the Chancellor of the Exchequer with the voice and the feelings of the. people, and the Right Honourable Gentleman deserved the thanks of every man who had ever known the peculiar oppression of that duty, for he did not believe that, next to the discontinuance of the Property Tax, there was any measure for which the people ought to think themselves under greater obligations. But he hoped the Right Hon. Gentlerriaol l would explain himself on one circumstance, and he i wished he had been in his place that he might have heard what he was about to state. It was evident that it the war duty on malt should be continued till the sth July, there would be a general stagnation of the brew ing trade, unless the brewer could have a relief upon the beer equal to the relief he would have upon a quan tity of malt when the duty should be discontinued. —The general anxiety, he could assure the House, was very great to be informed Of the precise inten tions of the Right Honourable Gentleman on this ' subject ; and he hoped he would decide early, is order that that anxiety might be quieted. 'lle Molester, it was plain, would- wait for the war drawback. and the whole of the trade would be completely at a stand. From the statement he had made, and from the general expectations of the country, he did not • think Government would acquire any thing from its continuance till the sth of July. The Honourable Member then commented upon each. of the Resolo• tions which he had generally mentioned. He con sidered that part which regarded prohibitions as par ticularly necessary, especially as respected linseed, rapeseed, and some others which were once articles et commerce and of some profit, but which were now used as a change of provender for sheep in Lincoln. shire, in Cambridgeshire, and in seine parts of Nor folk, where they had been carefully cultivated. As the butter trpde was to come under discussion sepa rately, he should not trouble the House at present upon that subject. The Honourable Member, after expressing a hope that the Committee would frame ' such measures as would restore the drooping agri culture of -the country, concluded with thanking the House for the attention with which they had heard his observations. - The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER thought it better to hear the opinions of others before he ventured to state his sentiments-upon such an im portant subject as the present. It was sufficient for him to answer a stagnant which !lad hogn made i . m rpoo p r o gi r ir t ea a ici n ft) c ta e l e iip i kui lt ect4. ' respecting the continuenee of the War Malt n Uty • reply to which seemed to be be much desired. ti, wns not at all surprised at the anxiety which had he, i considering lerm:;oanc the ( treat o, g iul r el e d a ta t box question to the agricuure. He by no means tlesee,l that the cout.try would be relieved !Teich by a n t of ihe tIX, for he that by thus relieving nne party the weight would!), ' thrown upon another. The best made of canciliarier tti pati att imi dea lit:it tee, all parties, he considered, to the Excise, to allow a draw-back upon all boor t brewed before the time of discontiwsing the tar, ere collectors keeping, a correct account that th e 5 i1 0 ,,, ante might be made according to the q uin i tyo d i • Malt manufactured. Lord LASCELLES believed, that there w ere great distresses somewhere, and indeed tit th ee who possessed his senses could be unconscious o r i t lee; w it he had never yet heard any person define the ca use of these .distresses. He could not but think that they i were principally owing to the state of the circulatio7 On the very tirst view of the Hon. Gentiane s ~4 gulations, it was evident, however, that the .... c ounty had been very greatly relieved already by the discs :t . cinuance of the Income Tax and the war Malt Du ty and the only remaining parts of the Suhi:ct were to ' diminish charges, and to induce speculations i e grain. This country was princ;pally comple te ; o f. two great bodies, the firmer and the tnanut eavra • and he conceived, that one was equa:ly de ..,.; protection as ith the other. He agr ee d i n tee pic.,h,-. bitien of, a number of commodities, bat niitke r e nor Itis constituents could agree to a n y prohikee e ,/ foreign wool. That was one instance in which, th u;11 we might not g.sin by the raw material, we prefe c t by selling the manufactured article in the very toile try from which we originally received that mtterril, The Noble Lord concluded by expressing it to be his firm opinion, that a gradual retrenchment was the great expedient which ought to be resorted to for tae resuscitation of agriculture and commerce. Colonel WOOD thougia, that when the House protected the butter trade they ought not to kept the great advantages 'hut we uld accrue from pro. tecting measures towards those parts of the ki ngAom which produced cheeses in great aeundauce. He would have a protecting duty on all articles produ ce d in this country ; but he would not take off' the ditty on spirits ; on the contrary, he would increase loud diminish that on malt and beer. Now, with respect to salt, he would have the duty on that artick also diminished, if not tak:n away entirely. In the whole Principality of Wales there was not one bit of fresh meat eaten by the poor from one end of the year to the other. On salt meat they entirely lived, aid therefine the Salt Duty was kit by them very !leanly. With reepect to the Horse Duty, he would harethet also taken off from the law termer; and likewise with regard to the Tithes end Puor Rotes, he emu& a great alteration wits necessary. He thought :rho that regulations about the circulating medium wee necessary, though be would not presume way v.h.o those regulations ought. to be. Mr. CURWEN cook a different view of the sub. jest from his Hon. Friend in some respects. Tl:e great and unexampled distress of the agricehurdl part of the country no person could deny, and no one was raore alive to than himself. Bat he coal not agree with his Hon. Friend,. that the distress arose from the surplus produce of the country. 11 it did, there Wai no.saying to whit leneth it enslef go. Sr the thirty years up to 1813, t h ere was an i import of thirty four millions and a h elf of queers ! cif };rein, toot in 1513 an import of only twelve Ultras intl. Therefore as the import had diminishel in proportion as the home produce increased, he &I not think the distress could procted from a serples produce. Here he would allude to an opinion which had been entertained by some persons, that it nu better kr the country to be an importer than a grower of corn. Ths opinion vas certainly a very dangerous ore, ;!:d 'kid been very fortunately long discarded by every pe:s:):1 ti the least isilecten, I.T it could not be wall thought that it W. 15 Inner :..; he dependent for the first necessaries of lite oft navel countries thin independent. From the year ISO:, there had unfortunately existed a jealousy between the mercantile and agricultural interests, as if the advantages of the one were inconsistent with those of the other ; but now there was luckily an end to that feeling, and most persons were convince; that the interests of both classes were so united, that one could not possibly suffer without the cditr. He really believed, there was not one tolerably informed man in the country who was not sensible of the trio dom of Parliament in adopting the measure of the Corn Law•of last Session. It any persons differed from this general concurrence of opinion, it was per haps some of the lower classes of mioulatturers, who ouly looked to the immediate puke of bread, without considering any of the consequences of the low price of that article. They also, he thought, would some time have thew eyes opened on this tub jict ; for they would see, that in proportion as e.e price of corn fell, their wages would be lonted' — But he could not think with his Honourableftkvis that the depreciation of corn arose from the surples produce of that article, and this he consdered I!.e most cheering prospect that the country bad before it. He. was convinced that his MjestVs Z•l'n'ttrS were as anxious as any persons in the country to re had but one object in view on the subject I !:;:t ti''' move the prt sent state or ag r i c ultural &stress, awl ail difficulty was how, or what were the means to pro vide a remedy for this distress ? He agreed with he Honourable Friend in thinking diet the Lamers Ltd not made such great profits as they were supposed to have made. They were believed to have made in general three rents, or three rents and a halt ; but be could not believe this, indeed he knew tat they did eot in general make more than two, or at most two rents :Rol a half ; and when the prLs i sum of the times, the general distress, and the I ca of taxation, the tithes, and the poor-rates, were con sidered, he could not but imagine that that very . general prejudice which • had existed with reg ard to them, that two years of distress were not sot 1 slant to reduce their profits to an equality with those of the other classes; must be abandoned.-- They also had laid out their capitals with liberality, as they expected the same returns which they for merly bad. There was an opinion likewise enter tained with regard to them, that their distresearose_ from their extravagance; but this he was convinc e d was unfounded; for he perfectly well knew, that the y did not live more beyond, or up to their means, these