The Express.
London, England, 1850-04-29 00:00:00

THE EXPRESS, MONDAY EVENING, APRIL 29, 1850.

WINDOW DUTIES.

Os Friday Irak susieses dsgsladas, represent-
ing swim arairary. pidossrapieel, sad eeehltestaral ueo-
eimine et eb seueretle. waked by eptektang ea the
dello&Chemelier et the I:chequer, a the subject of ths whitlow

Q=fa ispullatina hating bees introduced by Lord Ronan?
11=11 HOWARD, Bart. briefly stated the general
object he wheats the iaterraw hate been desired. He was,
himself, chairman of an association for improving the dwell-
lags of the working dames, which had found the window
dudes an insoprrable bonier to Its Dragnet. The seem
enmity of the model lodgings the society bad erected, ma-
sist,d Is the arnuipments they had made for an
deviate supply of air, ligkt, and water; but these arrange-
ments had led,nader the present system, to such as induce
of taxation, that private landlords amid not be expectot te
imitate their example. Upon the buildings of the society
La Use Panerefernad, they were actually eayine 1821. 18e.
window duty, of which the sum of not lees then 351. was foe
duties Merged upon their sculleries end water-closet.. If
the window duties were to be maintained ofim or this
deenritias lad the windows of beeement floors should, et
tad every separate mho el rooms let as
Mee =put wpm the some hada. as Members in
the In.. desert, which were Merged only at the rate of
le 9d. pets window.
' Mr. W. Z. HICKSON stated that the ease of the model
I lodging-houses, impos tent as ft was, still repreeented comps-
raUvely but • =all pert of • wide-spread evil. He would
beg to sell &Metals to its magnitude, by replying to an ar-
gement which had bees urged by the Chancel,or of the Ex. '
chequer in his place is the House of Commons. Sir Charles
Wood had contended that the window duties did not prose
upon the poorer duns of the community, Inasmuch as there
were 3,000,00 C houses in Great Britain exempt from their
operation. But why were 3,000,000 houses exempt ? Because
fa the are of certainly • third of the number they were in-
adequately lighted and ventilated, end wen so constructed In
order to evade the law. Cottages and farm-houses were
exempt; but the greet majority of the working (lama
did not live in either cottages or firm houses.
They were to be found in towns, lodging in the back rooms
of the upper 11 ten of what it. called under the Building
Act third and fourth rate houses; houses that should have
12 or 16 windows, bat the occupiers of which, by de/keels,
the steireases, peerages, closets, and cellars. reduced the
swathed below the chargeable maximum of 7. The extern'
of the mischief now in operation might be shown by an
extract from • recent parliamentary return :
Total number HMes liable to
of houses. window duty.
Birmingham 38,121 6,423
Bristol
Leeds
Liverpool
Manchester
Norwich 14,043 1,871
It ought by this time to be understood toat the sanitary
objection to the window duties did not apply to the windows
opened under the existing system, but to the windows closed.
The Chancellor of the Beekeeper was effusing to remit the
tax in favour of those who studied the laws of health, but a
landlord content to allow his tenants to live in dirt and
darkness, and their habitations to become • focus of con
teg.ous diseases, was to receive every possible encouragement
In favour of • man who had reduced the number of windows
in his hours from twelve to seven, the Chancellor of the Ex
chequer remittal 21.4 e. Od. per einem ; or of another who
bad reduced his windows from thirty to twenty, the sum or
4.. per scam. This was practically to sot the part,
not so mach of a flume minister, as that of •
minister of pestilence. The remedy, if the money weld not
be spared, was a house tax. Windows were, in fact, earls
of houses. Why not tax the houses as • whole ? Such •
tan might easily be rendered much more equitable then the
present mode of assessment, which bore co reference to the
'rentals. There were houses ia public thoroughfares feted to
the poor rate at 2001. per annuls that paid little or no win-
dow duty, the separate floors being cccupied es alive and
warehouses ; while private houses, of less than half the
value, in a bye aunt, were heavily taxed. If difliculies
arossin the aujustwent of this burden, while they were
under consideration, let • bill be introduce,' to emend and
explain Lord Althorp's act or 1834 (4 & 5 Wm. 4, e. 54), so
that the pledge which was then given might now at lest be
redeemed. The pledge was, that the amount collected should
not be increased, and that after the sth of April, 1835, every
one should be allowed to open new windows free of duty.
Lord Althorp's words were, that the effect of the act would
be " to prevent any increase of rev.nue in the case of houses
already existing." The window duty collected for the year
ending 6th April , 183.5, was 1,177,8561.; for the year ending
sth April, 1849, 1,813,82 W. A large portion of this increase
had been produced by a vigorous system of surcharges. A
quibble had been raised upon the messing of the act, and
the pledge had been broken. It was au extraordinary instance
of breach of faith. What would be said in private life of a
landlord who, after promising his tenant a lute at •
tined sent, raised it every year ? Paragraphs seminude ap.
paired in the nevrspapen headed " Conscience Money," from
which it appeared that individuals, wishing to make their
peace with God, sent large sums, of which they had de-
frauded the revenue, to the Chancellor of the Richey:ler.
He (Mr. Sicken)) trusted the time would come when the
conscience of a Chancellor of the Exchequer would induce
him to restore to the public that surplus revenue which
certainly, SILO, the pawing of Lord Althorp's act in 1834,
had been wrongfully obtained. Perhaps in another
session the Chancellor of the Exchequer would be
prepared with a comprehensive plan for a general
reyWon of taxation —abolishing the soap duty, the
paper duty, the duty on advertisements, &c., se well as the
window duties. A moderate house tee, as a substitute f a
some portion of the revenue escriflosd, would then be more
acceptable than at the present moment. But, in the mean-
time, the sanitary objection to the window duties must be
met. Permission must be at once accorded to the owners of
existing houses to render them healthful without having the
fear of the tax gatherer before their eyes. The case of the
houses now banding did not pram. If new houses were to
remain exempt altogether till another session, the
would not lose 60,0001., and would gain upon the timber
employed in their construction. Any delay in the abatement
of the present evil would be deprecated by public opinion, the
Board of Health, and the entire medical profession. A fearful
epidemic had raged last autumn. It might break out again
after the summer of the present year, and although it night
be said that there would be cholera if there were no window
duties, the purification of the air by all parable methods was
really the only known preventive. One broad fact was
this: the basement stories of several hundred thousand
houses in Great Br:tain being now inadequately lighted and
vent lated, become 1111!TVOill of mephitic vapours. These
mephitic vapours, when verified by the summer heats,
ascend to the upper floors, end subject the lomat s
to fevers of • more or less typhoidal form. The Chancel.
for of the Exchequer, therefore, so long as he maintained •
system which operated se • direct premium for the encou-
ragement of dirt, darkness, and defective ventilation, was
incurring • heavy responsibility: he was, is feet, making
himself the accountable agent, in the case of some thousands
of the population, for health and sickness, life and death.
Mr. N. B. WARD repeated the evidence he had given
on former occasions to the Health of Towns Commissioners,
on the physical influences of light, both upon ;dente and
animals, and exhibited specimens of pleats (presenting •
shrivelled and withered appearance), which had been grown
without light, under circeastaaan otherwise favourable.
With regard to the effect ore wanted light on the human con-
stitution, he had frequently traced some of the most
lamentable instances of disease that he had ever met with in
his profemional career as a surason, to the living in darkened
rooms—that is to say, in rooms of which one or more of the
windows had been closed to avoid the duties.
-....-_

---
Colonel SYKES wile desirous of expressing his strong
conviction that the evil now in operation was so serious that
it was hardly possible to exaggerate its baneful influences;
bat he felt convinced that the facts already stated most have
weight with the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and that the
system would be abandoned. It was both a sanitary and a
moral gunnel, and the argiunente in (avow of $ change
were of the gravest imrrtance.
Lord ROBERT 0 OSVENOR observed that all men
were now so fully agreed upon the magnitude of the present
evil, that he meet really put it to the Chancellor of the
Exchequer as a great public scandal that the resistance of
the goverment to a simple measure of sanitary precaution
should have ban prolonged up to the present moment. It
must be obvious to every one that the window duties could
not be defended upon financial grounds. If the
money were required, it could be raised by a moderate
sad equitable housiotaz, which he, Lord Robert
Grosvenor, should be quite willing to support,
as &direct tax, preferable In many ravens to other fiscal
burdens antics trade and iadutry.
Mr. CHARLES FOWLER, for himself and his brethren
of the architectural profession, would testify to the
general fact, that the window duties wen °Nee.
tionable, not only on sanitary grounds, but also
as occasioning much structural deformity, and as
imposing an insuperable barrier to the programs of
domestic architecture. He felt anxious that there
should be no attempt mods to modify the present system, in
order merely to palliate the evil, but that it should be wholly
abolished. Ths great point to contend for was perfect
liberty Ia works of construction in the direction of improve-
meat. It was preposterous to make the taszgatherar a
nun of architectural designs, and ta allow him to blot out,
ad Mitre, the features of a building most essential to its
health and cheerfulness as a human habitation.

The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER eaM that
the deputation would not of cones expect hint to reply then
specifically to the different points on which he had been
addressed. It had been his duty ti listen to their represen-
tations and it would also be his duty to receive word other
deputailons that had written to request an interview upon
the MEN subject. Toe question of the window duties would
receive the fullest sonsiderstion of her Majesty's govern-
neat.

ARRIVAL or QUINN'S TILOOPS AT Mauitne.—The
Tartar, troop ship,arrived at Fort Bt. George, on the 19th of
February, with detachments of ofEen and men from Eng.
land, to join the 15th Dragoons, 25th, 51st, and 84th
regiments of Infantry, reeving in the Madras presidency.
OPENINO OF Tin HULL BATIIB AND WARN-
I HOUSE'. —On Moody last this establishment was opened to
the public without any formality ; but the advertisements
announcing that hinny of inspection and a free use of the
bathe would be given wfts sufficient to attract thousands to
the inspection, end a thousand to the baths in the short
space of ef,ht hours In fact, so thronged did the place
become, so uproarious were thous who could not obtain ad.
mansion, and so disorderly were some who had obtained
ad/ninon, but could not readily obtain baths, that the per-
mission of free en,rassoe was necessarily withdrawn. A little
damage was done by some riotous youths during the period
when the numbers became ungovernable, and the assistance
g( the polies bed W be called in.-11444 Advertiut.