The Express.
London, England, 1847-02-16 00:00:00

THE EXPRESS. TUESDAY EVENING, FEBRUARY 16, 1847.

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penkored by the noble lord, considering the doulus which
hasFaes expressed with reglad to that scheme, he would
onto agdpst it, boa the government held out no such hope*.
The tight bea gentlemen the Chancelkaof the Exchequer
stated that one objection to the measure was the largeness of I
the sum to be given to Ireland. He had hoped that the
government would have eonadered and adopted that plan
when It was urged upon them by those who knew what the
real state of distress in Ireland was; or that they would
have brought forward a system of government railways
something like that which had been proposed SWIM
years ago. In France, although there was usually
some penuriousness in the system of public expenditure,
the government had been committed to a system of railways,
and they had found their account in it, for by letting them
on short leases they had obtained good returns, besides the
advantage of the government being enabled to let them on
better arms when the short leans expired. He had hod
the gosernment would have done something like this ; hat
as they had not done so, and as they had stated that the
expenditure by means of the scheme was too large, there
was only one chance of getting such an expenditure as wee,
be believed, necessary, and that was by supporting the hill
of the noble lord ; and on that ground he should vote for it.
He was sorry that the right hon. gentleman the Chancellor
of the Exchequer had thought it necessary iu his speech to
throw discredit on Ireland in the matter of the repayment
of public money. lie had rather over-stated his case
and furnished arguments which might be used here-
after if it was necessary to come forward with at
advance of larger sums. The statements of the right hon.
gentleman were not consistent with the returns which had
been furnished to the how. It was important that this
matter should be cleared up. If it was considered that the
gamey which had been advanced to Ireland had been jobbed
and lost, it was hopeless for the Irish members to ask aid for
Ireland. The first item mentioned by the right hon. gentle-
man was an advance to the city of Dublin of 244,0001,
called the Wide Street Loan, which he said was never re-
paid. But the fact was, that a portion of it was repaid, and
the right hon. baronet, the member for Tamworth, when he
was secretary for Ireland, raid that it was only a small and
just compensation to Dublin for the removal of a resident
parliament and gentry, and it could not be expected
that the loan would be very punctually repaid
after that. Allowing that the statements of the right
hon. gentleman were true, yet all those advances were not
made out of English money, but out of the revenues of Ire-
land. He (Mr..l. O'Connell) had moved for a paper, in
1845, which showed, that while the remittances from the
English exchequer to Ireland, from the union up to that
' year, had been 9,000,0001., those from the Irish exchequer
to England had been 26,040,000/, being 17,000,0071 more
than were received. With regard to advances for the Lag-
gan Canal, it was from a sum of 500,0001 voted for canal
navigation, not by the English, but the Irish parliament.
In the annual accounts for last year there appeared
3,600,0001 for police purposes in Ireland. If this was an
Irish charge alone it would be proper that she should pay it,
but the constabulary did duty as soldiers, and if they had
not been established the army must have been increased by
8,000 or 10,000 men. Out of this sum, 340,0001 had been
repaid. With regard to roads and bridges, 600,0001. had
been advanced, all of which had been repaid, except 24,0001.
By the finance a-counts the total advanced was 9,000,0001., of
which 7,000,0001. had been repaid, and the other 2,000,001.
was in course of annual repayment. Ina document which was
published in 1842 it appeared that 15,600,0001. had been
advanced by Ireland to England, of which only 6,200,0001.
had been repaid la the report of Lord Devon's commis-
sion it was stated that from the higher rate of interest im-
posed on money advanced to Ireland than was paid by the
government for the money which they got, a profit of
50,0001. was made on 1,000,0001. A sum of 1,400,0001. had
been expended on Scotch fisheries since 1809 ; while on
Irish fisheries there had been only 300,0001 spent since
1800. A aura of 11,0001. was paid annually to Scotland
from the imperial revenue, as an equivalent to her, since the
period of her union with England. The treaty of union
with Ireland had been violated in its fiscal u well as its
other conditions ; its provisions relating to money matters had
bees infringed. The Act of Uuton contemplated the
injustice of the debt of England being placed ne
Ireland, and it would be impossible, as was the case in Scot-
land, to give an equivalent for it. It was provided by the
act of union that on the occurrence of two contingencies
only should Ireland be subject to that debt. One or these
did occur, but the other did not. In 1816 the act for the
consolidation of the Exchequer was passed. The consequence
was, that England was enabled to throw on the common
taxation of the two countries a portion of the charge of the
debt, which accrued before the union, which ought to have
been provided for separately. If that had not been so it
would have been a relief to Ireland of 60,000,0001. It ap-
peared bystatemrets is parliamentary papers that the relief
from taxation to England amounted to 47,100,0001., while
to Ireland it was only 2,670,0001. The imposition of taxes
on England was 4,620,0001., while on Ireland it had been
5,510,000!. The excess of relief in England was 6,500,0001.,
while in Ireland the excess of taxation wss 2,830,0001.
Nothing could be safer than the advance of large
sums to Ireland, if, at the same time, measures
were adopted to advance the general condition of
the country. He thought a loan should be resorted to, be
meet the difficulty, and its ultimate repayment would be
obtained from the revenues of Ireland without additional
taxation, if the condition of the country was improved.
There was a mistake prevailing with regard to the customs
duties in Ireland. The entire sum received from Ireland
was 12,000,0001. out of 50,000,000/. of the imperial revenue.
This was not because the Irish people were taxed lass au
those items, but because they were too poor to cams*
taxed articles. The customs duties, stamps, and post-office,
mid to the revenue in England was 29,11110,0001., while in
Ireland it was 3,000,0001., the relative population being
8,001,000 and 18,000,000. Why was the product in Ireland
only one-ninth ? The Irish did not refrain from using arti-
cles subject to customs duties, or stamps, or from writing
letters, merely to spite the English people, but they were too
poor to do so. If their condition was elevated, the revenue
would rise to 12,000,0001., without any additional taxation.
The excise in England produced 10,000,0001., the rates being
the same as in Ireland, whereas in that country it only pro-
duced 1,700,0001. The reason was the same—poverty.
,If the
Irish consumed articles subject to excise duty in the same
proportion as was done in England, it would produce
4,700,0001., being 3,100,0001. additional, which added to
9,000,0001. customs duties, would give to the government as
a reward for doing their duty to Ireland, an addition of
12,000,0001. to the general revenue, besides giving her the
capability of bearing the income-tax, the lend-tax, and as-
sessed taxes. There were means of raising the people to the
same prosperity as those of England, and providing a large
expenditure without taking one shilling of English money.
When speaking of loans to Ireland, one consideration seemed
to have escaped hon. gentlemen; that Ireland got no credit
in the public accounts for part of the revenue paid
by her. He alluded to the item of crown lands, in
which was included 60,0001. or 70,0001. of -Irak
.quit-rents and crown-rents for which no credit was givens
On manufactures, too, which were sent from England, the
duty was really paid in Ireland to an amount estimated by
the late Lord Congleton at 3:10,0001. ; add to this 60,0081. ass
70,000/ for crown rents, and Ireland might claim 400,01101.
of any monies advanced to her. It was poverty alone which
prevented the consumption of taxed articles in Ireland.
With equal rates, she only paid 4,500,0001., while England
was able to pay 38,000,0001. or 39,000,0001. ; but if she wave
raised to the same standard of comfort she would pep
17,000,0001. or 18,000,000!. indeed of 4,000,0001. He his
tiered that a loan charged on the security of the Irish reve-
nues would not be thrown away, if they did their duty te
that country and themselves, without tonsulting the in-
terests of party or faction, without building their
hopes on divisions in Ireland, and governing one perry
by means of another, but applied themselves to the noble
task of raising her from a mendicant province to a happy
sister nation. A large portion of the people of Ireland had
solved that problem for thenuelees, and thought it could not
be done by this parliament. If they did not devise means
to give a stimulus to the capital of Ireland, the money
poured into that country would pass through it like water,
and leave no benefit although it would prove a great loss to
England. By taking away her resident parliament, the
best customers of Ireland were removed, and her manu-
factures, the best source of employment, destroyed.
They implored the English parliament to consider these
things in time. Mr. Fox, in 1800, denounced " the whole
scheme of the Union as based upon the false and abominable
presumption, that they could legislate better for the Irish
than the Irish could legislate for themselves." The day of
retribution for that " false and abominable presumption"
was now at hand. At this time, forty-six years after they Lad
perpetrated this great injustice, an echo was found in this
country to the voice of Irish discontent. That eche would
swell until at last repeal was granted. Let them hasten to
grant it. Those who demanded it were actuated by no
paltry sectarian or provincial spirit. They desired repeal as
an act of justice towards Ireland, but they equally desired it
because they believed that the permanence, the strength, and
the prosperity of this empire would be best promoted by the
restoration of the Irish parliament.
Captain COREY declared his desire to consider this and
all other measures referable to Ireland free from all party
or political hist., and with a single view to the interests of
the nation. lie thought the extension of the railway system
would be productive of good to Ireland, but he could not
approve of the particular measure now brought for-
ward, or consider it as well adapted for the first object
it was designed to effect—namely, the relief of the existing
distress-
Sir W. CLAY said he should vote against this bill, be-
cause he was disposed to think that the House of Commons
stepped out of its place when it suggested expenditure to the
ministers of the crown. The duty of that house was rather
to check and control the expenditure than to seek its
augmentation. He felt doubtful also as to the miens of
raising this money to lend at 34 per cent., when the market
rate of interest was so much higher. But, whilst he con-
demned the bill on these grounds, he must candidly soy that
he thought the subject itself was well worthy the most
attentive consideration of the house, and that he could not
at all concur in many of theobjectiona which had been urged
=the gooiest proposition. It had been slid by some
a immure was opposed to the fiat principles of poli-
tical steamily. But the same argument might be urged
spirt the extension amiantus to any branch of industry.
It would have especial weight with reference to some of the
measures which the government had recently brought under
consideration ; and for his own part he thought an advance of
mosey to well selected lines of railway would, on the whole,
he lees opposed to the principles of political economy thin
the expenditure of money in many of the modes proposed by
thegovernment (Hear.) But then, it was said, the effect
1 this measure would be to divert capital from its ordinary
channel. Now, he should not object to see capital diverted
from employment in England to employment in Ireland.
That which was wanted in England was not capital but
Ili=t for pital ; the exact convene held good in
m"'
Oh !ca
but," said some, "the tendency of this
Mllll~l is to encourage speculation." Now, be could not agree
In thinking it was a sufficient reason against any line of
patsy otherwise desirable, that one of its effects would be to