Star. — London, England, 1822-02-12 00:00:00

p patty. So that while the fanner was rising in g ains, the friends of the Exchequer were a ft er hint with nimble and incessant foot. If the fanner bed obtained more as a producer, he spent more as heon sumer. He employed his gains in . purchasing la. Pair; In' putchasing commodites, and to spectdatiTra, of Various kiwis. MI the debts contracted by 'him, were now increased, though they remained at thel same nominal amount. He had to sustain all the losses consequent on low prices, and the unprodue tiveness of land. Sapposing a land-owner to have been worth ten thousand pounds a year,. of which increase was aiiiiirdinglyanide, and Minreli was fire thousand pounds came to h i m in money if his the happy Officer's attachment to hi s p l ace t h ere b y income fell 50 per cent. the income was one ; and strengthened. Well, two years more elapsed. Whatl in proportion as the value of land fell must hisincome, has t hi s maturagnaiised ill years in off i ce ? be reduced. The first operation t hen of the Parlia- H a s be dung to his .putecfer.4 yealeog nierm? Surely meat must be to reduce the public burdens—(Hear). he deserves to be rewarded. ~If such an officer were They must relieve the agricultural interest by a re- to be neglected, what a pernicious example of neglect auction of a vast mass of taxes which pressed directly would tt be. The State would 4 o to decay—his sa-1 on it. Ills rents must increase, his expenditure must Lary mast be it creased I And so it was raised to two diminish, and a small sum must go a longer way ; thousand two hundred pounds a-year 1 Suds was an and if, after all, they found the stat e of the farmer e xample of the unspari ng s y stem o f expen di ture w hi c h to be such that the landed interest could not bear the they were now called upon to review. If they wished still ought they to ad- to save the nat i on f rom s hi pwreck— i f they would pre. burdens imposed upon it, minister relief. The landed interest was so weighty, vent a national bankruptcy, they must reduce. Re it was so bound lip with the interests of the State, duction was the one and only remedy—the only , that the only means of administering redress was a source of sal vat i on to t h e country. W hat m i ght be reduction of the taxes: and, if all possible reduc- the plans of other Gentlemen he knew not, though he non would not do, they must have recourse to was led to apprehend a good deal from certain por other measures to meet this paramount unreasoning tentous hints; but he was sure no one who had the state of c i rcu mstances. T o tam p er with the public interest of the country at heart, would attempt to di creditor—to break t he so l emn e n gagements entered minish the pressure of the burdens by increasing the' into by the Government, no man would be mad facility of borrowing. He cared not•from what guar enough to propose. The less startling proposition ter the proposition came, •but he would exhort the of interfering with the currency again was equally House to look at it as an evil. He would beseech repugnant to justice and feeling. To restore the cur- them to close their ears against any proposition rency was one thing—but to alter it again when re- having for its object the shifting of taxes from one' stored was quite another. The evils attendant no the class to another. Such a process, if carried into measure that was now i n operation were nothing in effect to-morrow, could not have the lea s t effect to. the scale compared with the danger of again tamper- wards giving relief to the country—(Hear, hear).— ing with it. Let the Government look to thecondi- But even this . proposal would be nothing to the in tion of the agricultural interest, and every interest sanity of reviving the Income Tax. Let the House in the country in tu rn , an d not wait for the approach apply its experience of the history of this tax to the of that necessity, whose mandate was imperious and future—let them remember that it was the chosen peremptory—and he should call it an imperious ne- ground of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that If cessity if the land-owners continued to be in the same once he got upon it he never would leave it. The situation that they were a t that moment. For it was Income fax, of all others, afforded the greatest fa easy talking, to say that the distress was the " result edifies of increase, and was for that reason most ob of a few temporary changes—a slight shifting of in- jectionable. Should Ministers but once be permitted ter ests—a small transfer of property" that was going to enter upon its threshold, there was no telling the But these words, insignificant in appearance, lengths to which they would _extend it. They would when interpreted, meant neither more nor less than the craftily creep into it ; but their desires, small at first, l a yi n g waste of a large ani fair portion of England— would soon swell themselves beyond all bounds.— the breaking up of endearing ties—the destruction Like the poet's description of Fame— of local attachments and interests, which continue " p ia metu prima mox sew attonit In auras, longest to keep their hold on the human heart—the " Iratrarlituroae solo, et caput inter nubile coedit!" tearing up by the roots that fabric of society, which, The House should therefore be particularly guarded though it may flourish in its more ornamental and against conceding theist an Income Tax (Hear, hear). less subaantial part, is bottomed and pillared on With these observations he would leave the question. the :anted interest, and must . crumble to pieces He begged pardon of the House for having tresimissed when that landed interest shall fail—(Hear, hear).— upon it so long. It was with reluctance that he To lead the life of an incapable and ho'peless debtor entere d upon• the subject so very much at large; —to fear every new face that came , into the neigh- b ut h e f e l t t h at he should forego his duty to th is bourhood—to live in terror of every man who may House, and disappoint those strong expectations which approach him in the garb of a stranger—and after people out of doors indulged towards their Repre baying paid out of the hard savings of former years— sentatives here, Wile did not caution Gentlemen against (for it could only be out of capital that farmers could trusting to visionaries—to• men visionary in their pay their rents)—to be obliged to break up his little plans of ; relief, but fatally effective in their schemes establishment and emigrate with the wreck of his of distressing the country. One word more only he fortunes—this was the meaning of that process which would say of the motion which he was about to offer was known by the gentle denomination of a " trans- to the House. • That motion did not pledge Gentle fer of property." When the destruction of a country men to any distinct sissies of retrenchment; it did was spoken of, it was not meant that the land was not.state in what particular branch it should be made. gene—that it had sunk into the sea—that the owners These who were aVerse'to keeping up the foolish and had been covered in the soil and salt sown; but it hurtful project of a Sinking Fund, as well as those meant a great change of property—it meant a vast who still adhered to what he was now warranted in mass of individual misery. This was the meaning of calling " that exposed delusion," might equally vote the destruction of a particular class—and when ik for it, because it pledged them to no opinion upon touk place amongst a whole community, it was called the expediency or inexpediency of maintaining that the de.truction of a country. Reduction of taxes was fund. It pointed out no particular relief; it pledged then the only course for the Government to embrace— its supporters to no particular remedy. It addressed retrenching every possible expense—the lopping off itself to no particular class of men, but it challenged of salaries—not confining the operation to a few un- all who thought that some relief was necessary der clerks in an office, but beginning at the highest, (Hear, hear)—all who felt that in the present me and carrying it through every class. Let them not lancholy and distressed state of the country some be told that men with salaries from the State would diminution of taxation was called for, without re thus be underpaid, for they were the only persons garding the p r ec ise manner in which that diminution whose incomes had not suffered. He would not lay wa s to be effected and the only party to whom it did down any standard of reduction, but let it be to the not address itself; were those who had some'other extent that would give relief. He had loc*ed into nostrum to ease the country—who thought the op the papers before the House, giving statements of the pressive system of taxation so beneficial, the present reductions made from time to time. He would not system of Government so impeccable—and the pre give much credit to Ministers for the reduction of sent complaints of distress so unfounded, as not to last year, which, he understood, amounted to a mil- afford even a pretext for this House to interfere— lion and a half ; for much of that was the consequence (Loud and continued cheers).—The Honourable of deaths—among others, that ever to be lamented Member concluded with the following motion : one of her late Majesty, and the death of Bonaparte. " That it is the bounden duty of this House, well considering It would be found that no greater reduction had on the pressure of heavy burde in nsoa all Agriculture, to ob tain m are pard the whole taken place than was necessary in order to creurineY;eopn t use en le such a reduction of taxation as was suited to the meet the rise occasioned by the increased value of change in the currency, and as would afford relief under the pre money. He found that the cessation of the Income sent distresses of the essuntry:' Tax produced the abolition of offices apparently, which The Marquis of LONDONDERRY began by as stood the country in £l5OO a-year. He had always ima- swing the House, that all the Members of Adminis gined that allowances to officers were paid in propor- tration were prepared to push reduction to the utmost • to the length of the services they performed. point to which good sense could carry it ; and, had 'a —But in this instance it appeared that that rule was , the Hon. and Learned Gentleman's proposition been departed from ; for it appears that, by the abolition put in a tangible shape, it should have had his sup of the office standing the country in £l5OO a year, port ; but the Hon. Member must be aware that, in there was really but a saving of £3OO a year, the dif- those mysterious allusions which be had made, be ference going in allowances to clerks. Here was an could realize no beneficial results to this country. He instance of a large scale of allowance. He would Would now come to a few of the exaggerated state now slew an instance of augmenting salaries. One ments that had been made, though he believed he would suppose 1816 wasthe year in which, if salaries sat in a part of the House where many were better, were to be increased, the increase ought not to take able than him to detect many fallacies in the place; and yet that was the year in which the Corn- detail which the Hon. Gentleman. had entered into. missioners of Excise and Customs, and the Chairmen But that was not before the House; and therefore he of the different Boards, were endowed with a perms- should only apply himself to what he believed was nent increase ; and this extraordinary bounty was the object of the Hon. - Gendarme's proposition. He conferred for the loss of patronage:—in one case, in should not have calumniated the Parliament as hay. consequence of having lost the appointment of two . ing a base subserviency to Ministers ; but he should yachts, supposed to be worth 0200 a year. And for have waited to have heard what Ministers, with their she sake of symmetry in the public departments, the means of looking at this great question, had to pro. same sum was granted to the COmmissioners of pose.. He therefore hoped the House would not allow Stamps, in consequence of the same loss of patronage. the Hon: Gentleman to entrap them into an early de. —(Mr. Hume corrected this latter statement in a cision on a question of such magnitude as this. The whisper.)—Well, then, they received the addition, Hon.,Gentleman should ; bate. looked to amending though for no alleged loss, shewing that the consider- the prospect of the country for the future, rather than ation was made according to a calculation in money, go back to reproaches for conduct pursued during so forcible was the love of symmetry in the breasts of the war, which the voice of Parliament and the Na.. the Ministers. But the House should hear another tion called on them. to tarry on with. vigour. The instance of this extraordinary bounty of the Govern- Hon.: Qentienian had. vilified, die : Finance Report; meta. The office of Secretary to the Board of Cou- and with it some of the most active and zealous troul had a salary attached to it pf £l5OO. In the Members of that House. •It was easy to look coolly year 1813, three hundred pounds a year was added. at things .which bad gone by, but could : the ' Duke In two years after. the Ministers discovered that the of Wellington -wait For an estimate. heßtre be at fieudernan who held the office.haai been doing the .l teniiited to fortify the lines of Torres Vedras? The, things,cou - ld not t. „ a long,. lanaoltler. Mid the fundbolder.,cpul4 interfere with each other; . for at present,the stoCkholder.might, in many vales, be. 'limited Akita heir with the land holder. If 'by an alteration in • the currency the stockholder derived more - firm the Public than he was entitled• to, that would be a subket,for consider ation; but that was.aot the case. ~T he alteration in 'the currency had been mach over-rated, and on a fu ture day he should state his sentiments On this sub ject to' the Home. • Mt. W. To PEEL was happy to learn that a re duction was to be made in the salaries at the - Public ' 0 ffices. - Thongh a great reduction could not be made, yet at least a good example would be. shewn. Mr. BROUGHAM rose to reply. The . Noble Marquis-had•stated that he (Mr. Brougham) was not justified infinding fault with the extravagance Of „our .military expenditure, because be had been a party to the suggestioes of General Cntwfurd and Mr. Virmd ham, en which it was founded. Now upon this point the Noble .Marquis was completely in error. The first of the two Gentlemen whom the Noble Marquis had named be bad never seen, much less exchanged a word With; in his life;, the latter ' • much to his re gret, he bad never known , - t hough he had sat.for a short time in the same Pailiament with him. The Nob); Marquis seemed likewise to have forgotten that the suggestions to .which he bad alluded were rnade`ki the year 1809, seven long years before he (Mr. Brougham) had enjoyed the honour of a seat in Parliaments-(Hear). The whole dead weight of the Half-pay List, in wbich was to be included the in and out-pensiopers of Chelsea and Greenwich Hospitals, the - remuneration' to. wounded Officers, &c. now amounted to £4,700,000. This sum theNuble Mar quis had rep resented as the difference between the Half pay List of 1792, and the Half-pay List ofthe last year -a difference which he It wise stated to be caused by the adoption of the plans o late Mr. Windham., Such an exaggeration was so preposterous and absurd that it would be an idle waste of words to take any trouble to expose it. The Noble Marquis had like wise said; that the House might perceive how paltry was the relief to be expected from a reduction of taxation, by reverting to the- small practical benefit conferred upon the country by repealing £18,043,003 of war taxes in the yoai 1816. But he would ask the Noble Marquis and the House this one question-sup posing that the House .tsf Commons bad not compelled the Ministers to do their duty and repeal those taxes, what would have been the condition in which the coon try would now have been plunged; would it, or would it not, have been unable to pay them ? He boldly said that it would have been unable, and he would shortly state the reasons why. The alteration of the currency, by increasing the value of money, had produced the same effect upon the country as if 03,000,000 had been added to its taxation, and that Irise in the value of moray had placed a heavier burden I upon it than had been taken away by repealed taxes. If, in addition to the weight of taxes under which the people of England were now groaning, they had to support the weight of those £18,000,000 of taxes to which the Noble Lord had alluded, increased as they would have been in value, though stationary in amount, it would be absurd in any man to deny the impossibility of the country's supporting so intole rable and unparalleled a load.' The statement of the Noble Lord, therefore, :treed, instead of injuring, the argument which he (Mr. Brougham) had used . The Noble Marquis had told them that he would not call on them to negative his (Mr. Brougham's) proposition on the present occasion; because if they did not like that which he himself intended to submit to their notice on Friday next, they might then move it as an amendment. .No sooner, however, had that expression escaped him, than he recollected that there might be something serious in it, fir it might hap pea the country gentlemen, finding his plan to be no plan, and his relief nothing entitled to be called by that name, might: then affirm the proposition which he had that evening endeavoured to get rid of by the previous question. So the Noble Marquis im mediately set about impaling another string to his .bow. " I'll put off," said he, " the decision on this famous plan of mine . a little longeri rather than let the country gentlemen.have an opportunity of com ing so early in the Session to a decision on the ques tion of reduction or no reduction of taxes. I will tell them to take as much time as they please, and not to make a - hasty decisiOn upon it." Thus, by foul means or fair means, by wheedling one party or me. 'lacing another, -by joking with a third, or threaten. tog a fourth that be will resign-that ultimates sup plicium which he reserves for his followers-(Hear Hear).-The Noble Marquis trusted, that he should 'be able to postpone for some time the evil day upon which taxation must inevitably be reduced-(Hoar). The threat of resignation was-the whip with which the Noble Lord used to flog up the sinking spirits of his adherents, whenever he was hard pressed on the subject of retrenchment, or whenever he saw that the feeling of the country was producing 'an effect on its .Representatives, or-at least on those nho ought to be .kaßepresentatives-(Cheers). In all such casi a the Noble.lier- Isis held out the threat of resignation, which spread mighty alarm Naomi his dependents, but not the slightest amt not the mass of bit constrymen-(Cheers). He (Mr. , Brougham) did not know bow the present motion would be decided ; but in whatever way it. might he decided, he was quite sure that 'the Noble Lord tirould not carry hikthreat of resignation into effesr-.(ebeera). 'He offered it as a topic of consolation to the Noble Lord's : trembling adherents, that the present minority, if the Noble Lord should be so unfortunate as to be in one, would•aot be the first in which' he had stood : and though on the former cc "dm he had said that such a circumstance might lead him to throw up his employments-there he still sat on the Treasury rlbach, in full possession of them all !-(Loud (leering).- •He must confess, however, that in the face of such tbbssts as the Noble Marquis bad-held out to the Country Cestienissi had not much expectation of their votes-(Cheers). -To remind diem, however, of whet their duty was, he should simply-state, that every. Gentlpman who voted for the previous question must country a' the enemy, and theqtfletual etseiny, of a re duction of taitation.—The gallery was then cleared for a division : ,e in ithe th r e be Nobl liev e i M tit a a r t q t u h is e 's red pl u it e n tl , °n or °T mu t : shheoldazeshwitrueanif ingredient ,4a For the previousquestion-sto Against it. Majority for Ministers 104 • The House then adjourned At Velma o'Clock. taxation =IOWA II . , .. k country .1,, Europe could boast - at mentiOneatt points to recall in.' 'attention, of the House the pmt of criminitioll andiiivradoi in_ which the oneurable Member had spo t t , bit ' le at the same time.there erm, in some parts of hfs• ad dress, a tone of seeming, candour and moderation which were well calculated to impose on many.. The speech fmmthe Throne announced the distress of the Country ; and his Majesty threw himself on his Par; lament on that momentous anbj ect . N ow •he put 14 itto th e House, whethe r , i n two or three days .the House could have come to any practical conclusion upon so important a question? On the occasion Of voting the Address, he •distinctly stated that Minis.. ters would, at a very , early day, be prepared to lay 'before Parliament A statement of what they intended to propose, and that the subjects which:Aber would' touch would become matters of separate discussion. They did not wish to take credit for anything which was not then fully made known ; a n d at t h e same J time he stated, that no Member would be pledged by the vote which he gave on that occasion to the support of any of •the measures which _might be subsequently brought forvratcl—(Heart.—So he would now say, and by supporting " the previous question," with which he should feel it his duty to meet the Hon. Member's motion, no Member would be precluded from supporting any measure of reduc tion which might be proposed hereafter. By moving " the previous question," he meant not to say, that the subject which the Hon. and Learned Gentleman had proposed might not be discussed hereafter, but merely that the present was net the proper time for the introdoctipn. All he claimed wai, that the House should notdecide until they had the whole subject on both sides fully before them--Wear).— He would have them enter into the consideration of such important Matters with all that light upon them which would be calculated to direct them to a just conclusion. He did not mean to deny, that instances might be shewn in which Parliament would be justi fied in retracing some of its steps ; but surely the House was not to be told that they were to come to such a conclusion on a single speech, without data to go upon, and without time for the fullest consider ation. He would not trespass much farther en their attention. He had stated the reasons which induced him to meet this motion with " the previous clues- , tion." On the proper occasion he would shew that the system of relief to be proposed by Government would be far better calculated to effect that object, and particularly the relief of the agricultural classes, than the plans to which the Hon. and Learned Gen tleman had alluded. When this system should be opened to the House, no Member would be pledged to vote upon it until tire had been afforded for its fullest consideration ; for there was nothing against which he protested more strongly than the endea vouring to procure a conclusion on a most im portant question by prejudices excited in the ab sence of full information on the subject—Wear), He hoped the House would set itself against any such attempts. Minister's, he could assure them, were prepared to adhere to every principle of economy, and when he mentioned the word " economy," he begged to be understood as meaning rational eco nomy—( Hear and laughter).—ln a short time the House would have to consider the whole situation of the country with reference to its income and expendi ture. They would then see what reductions bad been made, and what farther, if any could be made with safety to the public service. This was, he thought, the only fair way of coming to a rational conclusion, and the very reverse of that adopted by the Honourable and Learned Member. He trusted, therefore, that the House would concur with him in voting for the previous question.—The Amendment having been put from the Chair, Mr. CALCRAFT said, that the extraordinary state ment of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, on the first night of the Session, called for the motion of his Ho nourable Friend. The Noble Lord had stated, that much of the expense of the Army had arisen from the plan of the late Mr. Windham. That was not the case; as it was to the extension of that plan that so much of the expense was to be ascribed. But though the Noble Lord had lamented that expense, he had made no lamentation for other and far more glaring sources of expense ; and if the Noble Lord was serious in his profession to relieve the agricultural interest, that would be best effected by acceding to 'the motion of his Hon. Friend. The Noble Lord had, in the course of the last Session, made similar declarations in fa vour of the agricultural interest ; and what had he done with his Committee on that occasion? The Noble Lord had given no contradiction to the state ment of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that there was to be no reduction of taxes., He believed that the Noble Lord thought no greater calamity could befall the country than his loss of office. TGestimate the .merits of the Noble Lord, he would refer to Ireland. It was there he commenced his political career, and to it he would refer, as the test of his measures. Of Ireland nothing was beard, except in times of insur rection and bloodshed. In peaceable times, nothing was heard of that ill-fated country. The Noble Lora had charged Gentlemen on his (Mr. C: s) side of the House as having caused much of the present expen diture. But for, himself, he would say, that he had taken the sense of the House repeatedly against the enormous expense of the Ordnance. He could assure Honourable Gentlemen that he should not have been for pressing this motion upon their attention, had he conceived that it would interfere with a proper con sideration of the question of agricultural. distress, that question he was,biatylf deeply interested: with the distress which, made it Of such importance, he warmly sympathised. With the farmer he went " Along both heart aid mind, " A fellow-WI% inatheAlptaa wopirrout klpd !" As be thought that, the motion. of his Hon, Friend was calculated to promote Alwir beg inkeresfe. he should certainly advise him to pledge the House, it possible, to an immediate reductiob of taxation. A -Magian, ea the Ministerial . side *tithe House, 1 duty for firClute-Alless ns! .firt years! •The eitida *ow of. izoinsirip obit , Ildiffirailimit` ie. . p la4-r didgli. *Raderi, L ... -- .4aWairie Wag fbiwaid tiled& s° let„,___lliin crease all means u" * 'dell a/MP° a Year I nn country' in Europecould boa* - sit die time.: He I thiar "mid nut lug; fIuPP. ' liurdidl u 034 lee that the L e unman was ittofialv rriliAa nv.4 0.....01....m. ...-...-.1-:- A -. 1 . 7 ,.. k . 1 - .--. -..."77.7.‘..7"51 -iIir4I9S3PrrTIMITIIIIIII . .10 . .. . , • . . .. . • - ' • • . . • • ) • . . • . • • • • . . , I fatigue—the upris es . of-health—the d eve d nni f i n n how sparefimms ar mai . alail .or . dei ih k.,, l i,„,„ A Sit arwraisounit‘r_ the innendunint., . —the adthatt and • itdepillimirdu i o ng t h ey ma n y elevated Mr. w indmill , bto: Z i riii; - - -- - Gni/GA-RD° weviddiderwribilidosiriFlaad• omitted that his Vow, F r i en d-A n a mode k no t h at , Why, be was a most exemplary bli i gtar I— • inns -' - th e k_ c citiji •'. ' , I. _ taxation was dli. cause title present distress. Ike he eacellednny of tbtat Ai, that apllLecesssuc qua i l& t atbak i I Q" .f a n a p aiiis li tkon (1 , 6 ° 6 7 a r ' A r . l at was of opinion that - the' alterptinif_ In edie tttrolgt . cation of elinsink to islamie 1 instantly le; bit Na. w e h at rth n pa n e .d vvreer o f bur i n :i nn in: l ii nce es i n .:bad bet suittrili Aare in :de prevent; e lacy bottsdreasedl.:-(Le z cv_ sn eh a man denim w ar e t ot „did t k a ,4 ane ., Ru m b a , ter teke.inte ac . Hon. Gentleinanitai *said, that uses on assatisfac- el.4 . onrienmpentfav hie s pareevevanee _ t o r h is count,. oteli at the close. alit , mar wit had irodoed ! tUrell :might be transferred tit thseconswaser. litethfr. Rieardol.mras ;01,:npitioni that Abe. present sane of .1111 / 0 4 "4 :fi s tle tiel l l it;its , 7lo lu e il :al d ir e t illiilleistill'ili taininst. his ground s ' taxation jtiilthlllr. ti l :ennyoun tilir t ot: 4 l: l inipienur r at 4l 141141:45; relief whi li ch " i AAl i -108 . ..4' i