The Sun.
London, England, 1854-06-03 00:00:00

defrayed under the distinct authority of acts of Parliament.
The present plan, therefore, was no correction of an abuse,
but it was an improvement in our system of public ac-
counts, the bill providing that, instead of paying these
charges out of the revenue before it was received into the
Exchequer, they should become charges on the consolidated
fund, and, of course, the moneys now applied to pay them
would henceforward go into the consolidated fund in the
first instance. One small class of charges at present de-
frayed out of the revenue before it reached the Exchequer
was not comprised in 'schedule-A, and the Government
proposed to leave it in its present condition for an obvious
reason. The class to which he alluded consisted of a very
limited numberof pensions which, under various authori-
ties, were paid to the representatives of various families,
who inherited them from times comparatively remote.
With respect to these pensions, -it appeared clear—at least,
this had beets-the view taken by her Majesty's Govern-
ment, and het 1.-sight it would be approved by the house
—that the be course Would be to buy them up and so
dispose of them. (Hear.) He expected that, if judiciously
effected, this operation would be rather a profitable ar-
rangement to the public than otherwise, and it would rid
them of an anomaly attended with some inconvenience.
(Hear, hear.) A certain portion of these pensions had
been already bought up ; in point of fact, substantially,
the whole matter was concluded so far as regarded the
most impertant pensions ; but, from ono cause or anotthaerke,
the arrangement in several cases was not yet ready to h
effect. Until it did take effect he proposed to leave t. ers„
pensions precisely as they were at present, inastnuell
the Government did not look upon them as permanent
charges, and it was not worth while to enter upon new
.aorn
rangements respecting them. The next great descr
the ex-
penses of the collection of the revenue. The vnetrinr•hgee
outlay of public money under this head—
believed, to nearly 4,000,0001.—which had Isiea.,offororembethene
exempted from the control of the house, Nv
u
present year forwards, be brought regularly
be, however,
oiwtsecovenr,-
trol and cognisance. (Hear, hear.) It would
but fair to make two observationsonhtandishseuenbjpecrte.part thefor
first plaCe the form of the estimate
the present year in the manner t
the
beat d, a tnod t
he
e ht-
vernment, upon consideration, to
no doubt that, even if hon. gentlemen thought it ca-
pable of improvement, it would be received with indul-
gence ; but, of course, the Government would co-operate
in making any improvement upon it that might be devised,
either in form or in substance. In the second place, if it
should be found that these estimates added materially to
the time which was now occupied in Committee of Supply,
a serious public inconvenience might arise, and the house.
would have -to consider of some means of meeting it, but he
did not at present intend to propose any arrangement with
respect to that subject, as it would be better that we should
feel our way a little at first. The great practical advantage
which he expected would arise from bringing these esti-
mates before the bongo was that a new security would thus
be afforded for the performance of its duty by the executive
Goveinment. (Hear, hear.) Although it would not be pos-
sible for the house to enter much into the details of these
estimates, the advantage of voting money for the public
service in this particular form was, that it kept the different
departments of the State up to their work. He believed
that this was the important retdlt which would be effected
by the change he proposed to make, and upon which he
begged ta congratulate the house, and especially that hon.
gentleman who had so distinguished himgelf by his patient
recommendations in former years upon this subject, when
they were less popular than at present. He had now spoken
of the various descriptions of charges with which they pro-
posed directly to deal ' • first, the various charges imposed on
the revenue by Act of Parliament, which would be carried
to the consolidated fund ; secondly, the expenses of the col-
lection of the revenue, which would be carried to the votes;
and, thirdly, the pensions, which would remain at present as
they were, as he expected shortly toget rid of them altogether.
But, as they had been led in the course of this operation to
carry certain charges to the consolidated fund, they had
thought it was their duty, as a part of the operation, to
institute, as far as it was in the discretion of the Treasury to
institute, a revision of the charges already upon the conso-
lidated fund, for it was his strong opinion that there was
no matter in which this house had been more apt to he led
into laxity in the discharge of its duty than in that of
laying upon the consolidated fund charges which it ought
not to bear. The practical consequence of their doing sc
was, that those charges were placed beyond the control of
the Treasury, they were forgotten by this how-e, and there
was a great deal of neglect and abuse connected with this
part of the public service. He had no proposal to make
upon that subject at present, but he thought it would not
be a bad arrangement if some mode could be devised by
which the house could insure a periodical attention to the
state of the charges -on the consolidated fund. In many
cases the question of whether a particular charge ought to
be laid on the consolidated fund or presented to the house
in the estimates was a political question of great impor-
tance. He- would refer, for instance, to the charges con-
nected with the board of charitable bequests, and also to
those connected with the College of Maynooth, with re-
spect to which it was a most important matter of high
political concern whether they should be discussed in the
votes or laid upon the consolidated fund. He considered
that he should have been going beyond the limits of his
duty:. in connexion with one public department if he had
proposed by this measure to interfere with- any great poli-
tical questions, and, therefore, in the case of charges in-
volving any great political question, or appearing to involve
a question of good faith and of public contract, in which
vested interests, which .might fairly be so Called, were con-
cerned, he had left upon the consolidated fund whatever he
had found upon it. He might also advert, under this head,
to charges of the kind of the salaries of judges. Of course,
with respect to the judges of Westminster-hall, he imagined
that no one, considering the important position they oc-
cupied as great constitutional officers, would wish to see
thek salaries brought into the votes ; but with respect to
minor judges, although there were already certain cases
in which , their salaries were voted by this house, yet he
thought the question was not one that ought to be dealt
with incidentally as a matter of fiscal arrangement, and
therefore, as a general rule, he had left upon the consoli-
dated fund all the salaries of judges which he had found
there, although he did not propose that certain salaries of
judges which he had not found there should be placed
upon it. There were,- however, certain classes of officers
who discharged duties that might be called judicial, such
as revising barristers, whose salaries it was proposed to take
from, the consolidated fund and place in the votes ; and,
although the salaries of judges would be left upon the con-
solidated fund, all the collateral, incidental, subordinate
expenses of courts of justice, great and small, they pro-
posed to bring into the votes, for there was no department
in which the control of the Treasury, apart from that of
the house, would be weaker and more ineffective than in
this. This was the principle upon which they had pro-
ceeded; they had dealt in the manner that reason and con-
venience appeared to dictate with respect to those descrip-
tions of charges with which they were obliged to deal ;
and as the state of the charges upon the consolidated fund
necessarily came under their review, in so doing they had
so far made a revision of those charges as they could make
revision a matter of fiscal arrangement. The bill was not
intended to alter the actual course of the public disburse-
ments, although it altered the machinery of the public ac-
counts. He now alluded to the matter of provincial pay-
ments towards the expenses of the revenue out of funds
which were locally collected. They did not propose to
make any change in that respect. For example, under
one authority or another, the collector of the Customs
at Liverpool at present defrayed out of the revenue he
collected there both the expenses of the Customs' esta-
blishment and other public expenses, such as pensions,
&c., and they did not propose to alter the system, as it
would be retrogading instead of advancing, if they
had the money after it was collected transmitted to
head-quarters, in order .that, it might then be re-
transmitted
to the provinces. It was intended that in
those cases the disbursements should take place locally as
at present, but they would be subject to the same system
of accounts as all other departments of the public service
for which votes were taken. He might compare the pro-
posed system to the great number of services the expenses
of which were now defrayed in the colonies out of the com-
missariat chest before any Exchequer grants had been
issued, but which were as much the subjects of votes as if
they had been defrayed by Exchequer grants. He thought
he had n .w given a sufficient explanation of the general
objects of the bill. (Hear, hear.)
Mr. HT_TIVIE had heard the right hon. gentleman's ex-
planation with great satisfaction, as the proposed altera-
tion Was one which he had for many years advocated, al-
though he differed from the opinion he had expressed
with regard to the Crown lands. He thought that ac-
counts of such important departments as the Customs and