The Sun.
London, England, 1822-03-12 00:00:00

[MORNING POST.]

Some important proceedings took place in the
House of Commons last night. In a Committee
of the whole House, the Chancellor of the Ex-
chequer developed the full particulars of his
plan for relieving the country from one-half of
the expence hitherto incurred under the head of
the Superannuation Act. This is to be effected
by deducting five per cent. from all salaries ex-
ceeding 1001. per annum, and two and a half per
cent. from those which do- not reach that sum.
Thus will a Superannuation Fund of five per cent.
be created, and as the Superannuation allowances
are at the rate of ten per cent. on the aggregate
amount of all salaries, the public will only have
to make up the other five per cent. to complete
the whole. The scale of the Superannuation allow-
ances is to be one-twelfth of the salary for every
five years' service, thus making sixty years' ser.
vice entitled to the full amount. Certain re-
ductions are also to be effected in the amount of
salaries when the places to which they are affixed
shall become vacant by the resignation or demise
of their holders, and till then ten per cent. will
be paid on the amount intended to be dropped.
These are the chief features of the plan proposed
by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and adopt-
ed last night in the shape of a Resolution by the
House. The Right lion. Gentleman then made a
communication of a far more gratifying nature,
which will not fail to excite the most lively gra-
titude, accustomed as the nation has been to acts
of genuine beneficence and patriotism on the part
of her Monarch. lie stated that he had received
his Majesty's commands to acquaint the House
that he had given directions for reductions to
be made in those departments of his household
which contributed immediately to his personal
comfort. The amount of these reductions, which
will take place from the sth of January last, is
not less than thirty thousand pounds a year,
taken not out of the public part of the Civil List,
but out of the very moderate allowance reserved
for the personal use of his Majesty.

[THE TIMES.
The discussion on the Bill :or reducing the
Five per Cents. takes place on the second read-
ing this night in the House of Lords. Earl
Grey proposed that a case should be made out
for the consideration of the Judges, whether—as
by law the Five per Cent. Navy Stock could
not be,reduced till five-and-twenty millions of
the national debt were discharged—whether,
we say, such discharge could be considered to
have taken place by the operation of the Sinking
Fund. It was ingeniously suggested in the
House of COMMITS on Friday, by Mr. William
Smith, that though it was 66 a most absurd idea
" to assert that Government had a right to pay
46 off the 5 per cents., because they had from time
" to time borrowed money to reduce the na-
tional debt, and thereby created a debt still
" greater ;" yet, " as by the sale of the land-tax,
" and not by loan, above 25,000,000/. of the
" debt had been paid off, the legal part of the
66 question was set at rest." Upon this point we
cannot help introducing a quotation from Pro-
fessor Hamilton's book :—" This plan (the re-
" demption of the land-tax) is in effect no other
" than a transfer of part of the capital of the
" funded debt from the former stockholders to
" the landed proprietors. These last pay a value
I " for the capital with which they redeem their
" laud-tax, and their relief from that tax is equi-
" valent to their receiving a dividend to the same
" extent. The landholders may still fie consi-
" dered as sqhjected to the land-tax at its highest
64 rate, though some of them pay it by, drawing a
. " dividend for capital in the funds) which they