The Sun.
London, England, 1849-03-16 00:00:00

IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT.

ROUSE OF CONMONS, March 15.
IRELAND.
Mr. J. O'CONNELL gave rotice that on a future
day he should move that the House resolve i!self into a
Committee to consider the expediency of altering the
policy that had of late been pursued in Ireland, and the
introduction of a better system, with the siew of recti-
fying the evils of which the p;_ople of that country com-
plained.
AGRICULTURAL DISTRESS.—ADJOURNED
DEB
Mr. MILNER GIBSON (in continuation from our
Third Edition). proceeded—Did the Hon. Member for
Buckinghamshire mean to contend that a limitation in
the supply of food would make the inhabitants of towns
in the agricultural countries better able to bear the ex
cess oocal burd, ns? They were not likely to con-
ciliate the holders of real property in towns, by telling
them that they had no claim to have the excessive pres-
sure relieved by raising the price of food. Then, as to
the question of distress. Every body knew that the dis-
tress of 1836, during a period of high protcetion, when
•an .Agricultural Committee was sitting, was far greater
than could be brought forward at the present time. There-
fore, the question of distress, though it existed to some ex-
in the northern counties, and the question of real pro-
perty in towns, lied nothing to do with, the subject
before the House. He called the attention of the
landed gentry to the new status of the political party in
the country. If they did not consider well, the Go n:le-
men on the opposite side of the House might commit a
serious political blunder, the efficts of which could not
well be got rid of; The Hon. Baronet the Member fur
Essex, when addressing a large meeting of tenant-far-
mers the other day, told them he had no plan to propose,
but he advised them to be satisfied, and to have confi-
dence in their Member.—(Laughter.) The time was
come when Gentlemen representing the landed, the agri-
cultural interest, were about to be tried, and it would be
seen whether they were found wanting. This was the
moment in which it behoved Gentlemen opposite to
think well of what they had said on the hustings and led
their constituents to believe, and not to be led into com-
mitting a serious political blunder. He had never agi-
tated for the repeal of the malt-tax. He never was a
malt-tax man, but he confessed that he never had any •
peculiar affection for that tax. He always thought
there were good economical arguments against
the continuance of the tax. He thought
its existence injurious to the manufacture of
malt. It fettered and restricted the manufacture of malt,
and he regarded it as a pressure on the industry of the
country. There was an export trade in beer and other
produce of malt, and by raising the price of those arti-
cles they affected their export trade, and therefore their
import trade and the general industry of the country.
The arguments against the continuance of the tax were
of the strongest and most important character. The re-
peal of the tax might be justified on all those grounds
which justified them in selecting the Excise duties on
glass, paper, and printed calico, for reduction. If, how-
ever, lion. Gentlemen opposite turned their looks on the
movement in favour of reduction of expenditure, and fol-
lowed the will-o'-the-wisp of the proposition under con-
sideration, they would ran the risk of suffering the repeal
of the malt-tax question to slip their fingers, and the
opportunity might not again present itself of conferring
a boon on the agricultural and labouring classes, and of
contributing to the general interest of the country.
There was a sort of delicacy manifested by some
with regard to the discussion of the repeal of this tax,
but neither he nor the Hon. Member for the West Rid-
ing were afraid to face it, What was the real position
of the landed proprietors as a class in this country?
Were there net great social advantages connected with
the possession of property? Did not the purchase of
property almost at once confer social advantages? Did
not proprietors almost immediately become officers,
deputy-lieutenants, and fill other distinguished posts?—
(Laughter.) These things were sought after, and con-
ferred a value on property. He called on gentlemen on
the opposite side of the House to consider well before
they selected the motion of the Hon. Member for Buck-
inghamshire on which the sense of the House should be
taken. It was their policy, he might say their duty, and
in consistence with the course taken in their respective
counties, to give their support to the amendment of the
Hon. Member for Montrose.

Mr. SEYMER said there could not be a better test of
the existence of distress among the agricultural classes
than the disposition they evinced to emigrate whenever
they could raise the funds necessary for so doing. The
Chancellor of the Exchequer had attributed the exist-
ence of that distress to the language of alarm and ap-
prehension used at public meetings. He agreed with
the Hight Hon. Gentleman, but the language he alluded
to was that employed by the Hon. Member for the West
Riding and his friends. He did not think that it was
quite fair for the Anti-Corn-law Leaguers, to use at
different times, and in different places, arguments which,
if brought together, would have neutralised each other.
The difficulty of competing with foreigners was urged
on the ;one hand, while, on the other, the artizans
were promised plenty of work. The landlords were
told that it' the corn-laws were not repealed, the rents
would fall; and vs hen addressing the tenants, they said
that protection was the bane of agriculture. The plan
proposed by the lion. Member for the West Riding, with
the view of effecting a reduction of ten millions, was all
moonshine. The House had pronounced it moonshine. The
scheme of his Hon. Friend the Member fur Bucking-
hamshire was a just one, and should be carried out. The
maintenance of the poor was a national abject—it was
more—it was a national duty. It was a Christian obli-
gation imposed by a Christian creed. He had always
maintained that, win re there was a provision for the
poor, the wealth of the country should support its
poverty. He knew this had been called legaliz d com-
munism; but if it had been practised three hundred years
ago in Ireland, he believed that Ireland would have been
much better off now. His Hon. Friend's propo)ition
went neither for a revision nor an increase of taxation,
bat a shifting of the burden, according to the principles
of justice. lie would say on behalf of those men, that
they a ere open, generous, warm• hearted, sincere lovers
of truth; he could not say so much for their opponents.
—(Laughter.) Since the abolition of protection he con•
Bidet-Q(1 that there was an additional reason afforded for
a revision of the burdens imposed on the property of the
country; and the question so ably propounded by the
Hon. Member for Buckinghamshire, being now taken up
by the country, he had no doubt that in the end some
such revision as that Hon. Member proposed would be
gone into. He, therefore, most cordially supported the
resolutions.

Lord NORREYS said he could not support the reso-
lutions, as, if adopted and carried out, they would lead
to a system of centralisation which would be the means
of ruining the various interests of the country. It was
said all that was wanted was, that the House should go
into Committee on the resolutions; but entertaining the
opinions he did with respect t© them, he would consider
it a waste of the time of the House, end a trifling with
the public business of the country, to go into Committee
upon them. In respect to the amendment of the Hon.
Member for Montrose he had voted against the motion
of the Hon. Member for the West Riding on the same
subject, and therefore he could not support it.
Mr. C. LEWIS said the ground upon which the Hon.
Member for Buckinghamshire rested his case was, that
the local taxes of the country being directed for the pur-
poses of general interest, it was unjust that they should
tall principally on one species of property. That was
the foundation of the Honourab!e Gentleman's
argument, and in making out his case he ad-
mitted that he had stated, with precision and
accuracy, the various local burdens, in no case exagge-
rating, but rather falling within the actual amount of
those. In addressing himself to the subject, he would
confine his remarks to the question of local taxation, and
to its origin. He found that the incidents of local taxa-
tion arose out of the incident of the poor, and the provi-
sion for them being the largest and most important local
burden, he should confine himself to that, as giving rise
to the other local burdens. The Act of Elizabeth regu•
lating the taxation as regarded the poor, while it in-
eluded the occupiers of land and houses, also included the
inhabitants of the parish, and there was no doubt but
that the Act contemplated the making personal as well
as real property assessible for the purpose stated. When,
however, that Act was brought into practice, the Court of
Queen's Bench decided otherwise, and there was, there-
fore, no reason to believe that personal property had ever
been rated under the Act for the support of the poor, or
other local purposes. Some of the courts of law had
held that a person having personal property in one
parish, and resident in another, was not rateable; that
farm-stocking, cattle, horses, articles of husbandry, &c.,
were not rateable; that the wages of labour and pro-
fessional income was not rateable; but that stock in
trade, or the amount of profit it produced, was so; and
that was the only species of personal property which,
up to the present time was considered rateable. The
reason for excluding personal property was, that it was
found impossible to levy local rates on any other prin-
ciple than on the visible property within the parish, and
that the adoption of the principle of the income-tax in
levying these would lead to the utmost confusion. Since
1603, therefore, those rates had been levied o❑ the real
visible property within the parish, and he would state,
in a few words, what was their amount, in order to show
how much of them would fall upon the Exchequer were
the plan of the Hon. Member carried out. These were
as follows, taking the rate for the poor at the last
year's amount, and the other at the average they usually
amounted to:—
Poor-rate ...

Highway-rate

CCurch--rate