The Sun.
London, England, 1849-03-17 00:00:00

SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN.

Lord PALMERSTON, in answer to a ques-
tion from Mr. Sandars, said that ho under-
stood it was the intention of the Danish Go-
vernment, on the 27th of the present month,
to impose a blockade of the ports of Schleswig and
Holstein. The matter, however, was now under
consideration, and he hoped the intention would not be
carried into effect.
ADJOURNMENT OF THE HOUSE.

On the motion of Mr. PARKER, it eves agreed that
the House at its rising should adjourn to Monday.

PUBLIC EXPENDITURE.

On the question for going into Committee of Supply,
Mr. HUME said he had two motions on the paper,
one relating to the reported explosior s from; fire damp,
and the other having reference to the public expenditure.
By the new rules, however, if he proposed the
first, he should be precluded from bringing
forward the other, and therefore, as the
latter was of a more pressing nature than the
first, be should postpone the motion relative to the mines
till the next Supply night. Now the second motion was
as follows :—" That, in the present state of the finances of
the country, her Majesty's Ministers, before calling on
this House to vote the estimates for the public service,
should submit a general financial statement of the whole
or expected revenues, and the total intended expenditure
for the ensuing financial years;" and in the present state
of the public mind it became the duty of the House to ex-
act such a statement from Government. If the motion
were irregular or unconstitutional he should be the last
to press it upon the House, but when he recollected
what had taken place on former occasions on the
part of different Administrations, he could not
help feeling that they ought to have a
budget detailed to them before they voted
the money, particularly when he remembered that last
session they had no less than three financial statements,
and yet at the end of the session they had to borrow
money to make up for deficiencies.—(Hear.) The House
ought to be put in possession of an estimate of the re•
ceipts and expenses of the country, in order that
the House might have the power of bringing the esti-
mates within the revenue. Ministers had the means of
ascertaining with tolerable accuracy, or at least within
half a million, what would be the expected revenue
of the country, while they ought by this time to have
made up their minds as to what the expenditure would
be.—(Hear, hear.) The House, perhaps, was not
aware that it was usual for the Administration, in the
month of November, to call on the different departments
to prepare their estimates; and the House ought not
to be called upon to vote a single shilling until it was
put in possession of the estimated receipts and expenditure
of the country.—(Hear.) The House was the trustee of
the public accounts, and it behoved every Member to ex-
amine them with the same care as if they were his
own.—(Hear, hear.) At all events, if Government
would not accede to his motion, he could only come to
one of two conclusions—either they had not made up
their minds as to the expenses of the country, or they
were afraid to state them. They were afraid,
perhaps, to bring the expenditure forward now
for fear it should raise up such an opposi-
tion against them as would be difficult to contend
against; but fortunately this was no party question. It
was nothing that affected either Whig or Tory, and as
therefore there was no matter of political partizanship
involved in this motion, he called upon Members of
both parties to give it their support.—(Hear, hear.)
Now, ho could say no more on general principles. It
there was any thing, or any circumstance, that could
take the public accounts out of the category in which he
had placed it, or out of the prudent course which he had
recommended, he hoped they should hear some valid
reason for preventing its being adopted, and he should
bow to that reason, if he was convinced by it.
He had looked for the last eighteen years at the system
of the country, but he thought it necessary only to appeal
to a few years, and he could not see how ho would be
more likely to impress Hon. Members and her Majesty's
Government than by caging to their recollection what their
first act was on succeeding to the Government in 1830.
On that occasion Lard Althorp, on behalf of the then
Whig Government stated (and he believed there never
was a mere honest man to his (Mr. Hume's) knowledge
within those walls—(l.lear)—he would have taken the
word of Lord Althorp as soon as the bond of most men)—
when he introduced his budget on the 11th of February,
that he considered it his duty towards the Government
and the House to be fully prepared to state not only
what the revenue, but also the expenditure of the country
would be expected to be, and the changes which they
intended to submit to the House. = Lord Althorp on that
occasion said, " The estimates were then not all on the
table, but he was anxious to state what reductions
the Government had made, and what they in.
tended to do." He (Mr. Hume) wished
they were now in a situation to follow
the example of the Noble Lord Althorp on that oc-
casion, for he stated first that the income of the country
was then 50,000,0001. Then in the last year the
expenditure was 59,000,0001. and upwards. Here,
then, was 10,000,0001 of increased taxation, the re-
sult of the administration of the public funds from
that Cperiod.—(Hear.) He stated these circumstances
with deep regret, for he never experienced
morerfwerpeerennea tette withthe foreign states, and economy and reform,
grand principles on which the Govern..
mee
would act. It was re-echoed by Lord Grey in
another House; and although a number of years had
passed, yet Honourable Members
towould recollect that
say
to
period, and he would put it to them whetherthe that
declaration did not afford great satisfaction
try.—(Hear, hear.) He believedLordAlth°Pw nes
oecsi olong
-.
as he lived, maintained and kept to theserpr'aip
Sincej Lord Althorps time, he (Mr. . Hume)to say that rule had not been observed. On the contraryy
now instead of being in a condition to enjoy what we
ought to enjoy in a time of peace, namely, relaxation
from burdens and relief from taxation, we have actually,
since that period, been subjected to those heavy
charges, amounting, in round numbers, to ten mil-
lions more than the expenditure of that period.
He wished the present Administration would follow
Lord Althorp's example. Now, he said Lord
Althorp and the Whig Government of that day, having
adopted that course before calling on the House to vote
one single shilling, why did the present Government not
do so now? He, therefore, said the House was bound
to call on her Majesty's Government to do the same,
Much, however, of the objection which he entertained to
the expenditure of the Government with which Lord
Althorp was connected was at that time relaxed, be-
cause the Government were carrying on measures of
reform calculated to benefit the people. He confessed,
however, that his Hon. Friend behind him was right when
he had stated that he had been "hoodwinked,"
and in that fact the House and the country had been
induced to assent to that increased expenditure in the
same way as Sampson's locks had been shorn
by Delilah.—(Laughter.) The way in which the
Noble Lord proposed his budget of last year would never
be forgotten, since it had led to a storm which had
brought about very large reductions. And hero he
would take occasion to observe that, whether the
Government in office was Whig or Tory, all he
wanted them to do was to put on the screw.—(Hear.)
1 Wt hi is w
i't
tahse. estimated expenditure of last year was
54,59V00/ , the real expenditure was 59 00 , 0,0001.
what reform had done ; and yet he
had never asked for reform except that the King, and
Lords, and Commons might be removed out of
the power of the oligarchy, and that the Government
of the country might be carried on at a moderate
rate, The liefvrsa Bill had endowed the naiddle-classes

with vast power, and if they had neglected their duty,
they were now smarting for it. With such an expendi-
ture the distress of the country could not be a matto of
surprise.—(Much disorder prevailing in the House. (he
Hon. Member complained that he could not hear
himself read, and humorously referred to a ludicrous
mistake into which one of the Members of
the Government had fallen during the debate,
the other night when a Right Honourable
Baronet, according to his account, had fallen into a nap,
and hearing one exclamation from his (Mr. Hume's)
lips, had put a construction upon his words which
were altogether foreign to their real meaning.)
The Honourable Member then proceeded to continue
reading an extract from a speech of Sir Robert Peel, in
which the Right Hon. Baronet had called upon the
Ministry of the day to render a full account of the
means from which they were to obtain the sup-
plies before they were granted. He then con-
tinued to say that if he were to talk till four
o'clock in the morning he could add nothing to the force
of that appeal. He had now cited the authority of three
Ministers, Sir Robert Peel, Lord John Russell, and Lord
Althorp, all eminent men, and he sincerely trusted that
the Government would now follow their example, and
present a regular balance-sheet to the House, so
that its Members and the country at large might
understand what they were about. If they re-
fused, he should certainly divide the House; and he
called upon Hon. Gentlemen on all sides to support him.
Mr. Hume then concluded by reading the motion of
which he had given notice.

Sir H. WILL-OUGHBY said he had much pleasure
in being able to second this proposition, believing that
it would tend to produce an economical administration
of the national finances. The course proposed was
abundantly justified by a variety of reasons—amongst
others, by what happened last session. In the last two
years there had been an increase of between nine and
ten millions in the national debt. He entirely disap-
proved of the Chancellor of the Exchequer being al-
lowed to go on the Stock Exchange and sell portions of
stock from time to time, to raise revenue. The only
light yet thrown on the present year's finances, was a
statement of the Right Hon. Gentleman in the debate
on Mr. Cobden's motion, that the income and the ex-
penditure would probably be equal. He much
doubted this ; he thought it more probable there
would be a great deficiency. Last year he had under-
estimated the expenditure by 1,700,0004, arising from
three causes the Kafir war, the Irish distress,
and the excess on the navy estimates.—(Hear, hear.)
The Right Hon. Baronet had argued that, as these three
causes of deficiency were not likely to occur again, he
should be able, by a reduction of about a million and a
half in the estimates, to meet the deficiency which would
necessarily arise from the cessation of the corn duties,
the China money, and other causes. But was it not pro-
bable there would be a large extraordinary item for the
war in India? Already there had been a vote of 50,0001.
for the Irish distress; and he found there was already
an excess on the navy estimates of 323,0001., of which
some explanation would be required.—(Hear, hear.)
The estimates, as they were called, were becoming less
and less an index to the actual expenditure. The navy
excess had risen in three years from about 140,0001. to
343,0001.—(Hear, hear.) It was a fact that in the last
year about half a million had been spent on the
navy estimates more than was voted.—(Hear, hear.)
Though the 26th clause of the Appropriation Act allowed
the sum voted for one item to be applied to another, it
expressly said that the gross amount should not be ex-
ceeded. Hence the constitutional principle which en-
abled the House to control the expenditure was com-
pletely set at nought.—(Hear, hear.) On 26th February,
1847, the Secretary to the Admiralty had stated that
9,000 men were to be enrolled in the dock-yard corps, at
a cost of 20,0001, and yet an extra sum of 50,0001. had
been spent on this item. Unless the House could devise
some method of preventing thelrecurrence of this, it was
no use their voting estimates at all; they might as well
leave them to be voted by the Board of Admiralty them-
selves.—(Hear, bear.) It was most important not to
allow the Government to run any more into debt; it was
equally important, before voting the estimates, to have
before them such a statement as the Hon. Member for
Montrose now moved for. He was convinced that in
order to enable our productive interests to compete with
those of foreigners, !some measure of real economy must
be introduced.—(Hear, hear.)
The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER said he
was aware that the discussions on the estimates were
generally of a very discursive character, and that it was
difficult to confine them to the precise question before
the House. He would not follow the two Hon. Mem-
bers in some of these topics which they hail introduced,
and which were not necessary to the motion, to which he
would confine himself as much as possible. This was
not a new proposition of the Hon. Member for Montrose;
he had frequently called on the House to reverse that
which, so far as he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer)
knew had been the immemorial practice on those occa-
sions; and certainly the longer he remained in the
House the more was he convinced of the wisdom of those
rules for the conduct of its business which had been
laid down in former times, and had been sanctioned by
the experience of successive Parliaments. The rule
that no vote should bo proposed in ways and means
until justified by a previous vote in supply, was
founded in good sense; and when the estimates
prepared by the different departments had been
voted, it then became the duty of the Chancellor of the
Exchequer to submit to the House the ways and means
by which he proposed to meet that expenditure. It
would be a sorry answer, at a time when an enemy's
cruisers were interrupting our trade in the channel, and
threatening to invade our shores, to tell those who
claimed protection, that inasmuch as the customs revenue
was falling off, it was impossible adequately to protect
our trade, or our shores. He doubted very much
whether such a refusal would tend to prevent the revenue
from falling still further. The Hon. Member for Mon-
trose had drawn a comparison between the management
of public and private revenues. There was a great dif-
ference between the cases; and in one point they were
not only not analogous, but diametrically opposed to
each other. When a man found his income increasing,
be might be justified in spending more freely; but it had
always been laid down in that House, and he held the
doctrine strongly, that no improvement in the revenue
would justify unnecessary expenditure.—(Hear, hear.)
The Right Hon. Baronet the Member for Tamworth had
laid this down as strongly as a man could do, in the very
speech in which he announced a surplus revenue of five
millions—he said he did not consider that that surplus
justified him in calling on the House to vote a single six-
pence of expenditure beyond that which:the strictest ne-
cessities of the country required. Would the Hon. Mem-
ber for Montrose, after effecting certain reductions in his
domestic expenditure, go to his tenants and say:
" Having done this, I can now afford to reduce your
rents, and I will not call upon you in future for what
you have hitherto paid, and which you can fairly and
justly pay?" Yet, that was the course which it was
evidently the duty of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to
pursue with regard to the income of the country. It that
income were at any time more than sufficient to cover
the expenditure, leaving a fair margin, it would be the
imperative duty of the minister of the day to propose
some remission of taxation, and thus reduce the revenue
to that which was actually necessary to cover the expen-
diture. Here again the circumstances which would de-
termine the course of an individual, were in direct oppo-
sition to those which should determine the course to be
pursued in public affairs. In those instances in which
the financial statement had been made at an early period
of the session, it had always been when it was proposed
either to impose or to continue a large amount of taxa,-
lion; and the necessity of that course arose, not from
the mere ordinary events of the year. but as a justifica-
tion of the measure proposed by the Government of the
day in reference to a large amount of taxation. In 1845,
it was done because the Right Hon. Baronet (Sir R.
Peel) then proposed the continuance of the income-tax,
which would otherwise have terminated on the sth
April. In 1842, the Right Hon. Baronet made his
statement on the 11th of March, when he proposed to im-
pose the income-tax. The Noble Lord now at the head of
the Government had made a financial statement last
session at an early period, when he was again under the
necessity of proposing a contiuuance of the income-tax.
With those three exceptions, the Hon. Member might
go back to 1831, and he would find only one case in:which
the financial statement bad been made at an early
period of the session. If he would refer to 1835, the
year about which so much had been said in connexion
with financial matters, he would find that the statement
was made on the 14th August. Lord Althorp, when
making his financial statement on the 14th February,
had said—" Though I thus early invite the attention of
the House and the public to the subject, it is impossible
to do it in any but a general manner. It will be quite in
vain for me to attempt anything like accuracy as to the
amounts of expenditure in the ensuing year." Yet the
Hon. Member for Montrose now called for an adequate
return of the probable amount of expenditure in the en-
suing year. And it should be remembered that the esti-
mates of the three great services had already been laid on
the table of the House, and had been some time in the '
hands of Hon. Members; these formed nine-tenths or
more of the whole expenditure. He had already stated,
in general terms, that the probable amount of the miscel-
laneous estimates would not fall very far short of those
of last year ; and he had also stated, at an
early period of the session, what would be the
probable expenditure of the year. The principle
which had been laid down by the Right Honourable
Gentleman the Member for Stamford (Mr. Herries) in
the report which he had made to the Finance Committee
of 1828 was the sound one, namely, that their first step
should be to ascertain the narrowest limits within which
the annual charges for the public service could be con-
fined, and after voting the estimates, to state the means
for meeting the necessary expenditure. Such was the
principle that always regulated the proceedings of the
House. H e
ha eg agreed
ye
expenditure
thausreteehroetfa Ri
it
consistently
s te limitsntly
thatwith whichw a s theirt
with its best interests, could be reduced. He, therefore,
invited the Hon. Gentleman to go into the discussion oa
the estimates, which was the best test for the expendi-
ture. He could assure him the Government were ready
theei Right
te u
n Hon.ntary, o Gentleman
to listen to the propositions that any Hon. Gentleman
might make for a reduction of expenditure. They
were prepared fairly to discuss the estimates, and to
state their reasons for the amounts which they proposed.
He could now only repeat the assurance he gave on a
former occasion, that the expenditure for the year—
assuming that the miscellaneous estimates were of the
same amount as last year—would be within the income
of the country. The Honourable Gentleman said that
last year there were various financial statements made.
They had, last year, endeavoured in every way to re-
duce the estimates, and Committees had been appointed
to consider the expenditure. The Government, after
making their financial statement, were obliged to wait
the result of the inquiries instituted, and as soon as
they ascertained to what extent they could make reduc-
tions, they made new estimates accordingly. When the
Honourable Gentleman said that in former periods the
financial statement was made earlier in the year than
WM the Prtictice 10 present, he g3h9414 m 4190 that the