The Sun.
London, England, 1858-06-22 00:00:00

education, where were they to go for the paper duty?
(Hear.) Nothing would remain to charge but the waste
paper, and really it would not be worth while to keep
up all the machinery of the excise for what that would
produce. The objection to the ways and means might
be met by a reduction in the public expenditure, espe,
cially in the army and navy, the cost of which depart-
ments, which averaged millions a-year previous to
the late war, now amounted to 25,000,000/. a-year. He
trusted that the present Government would exert them-
selves to bring down the expenditure of the country
within reasonable limits, and that they would give an
assurance to the house that one of the first benefits re-
sulting from their adoption of a policy of economy should
be the remission of the duty on paper. (Hear.)
Mr. COWAN, as a paper manufacturer, could con-
firm the statement of his right hon. friend as to the effect
of the duty on the export of raper, and though there was
now no positive interference with the process of manu-
facture, there was still a considerable and injurious dis-
tinction resultiog in the system of labelling. Tae tax
operated most prejudicially upon literature, and was most
partial in its application. Indeed, it was difficult now to
say what was paper. Three or four years ago a gentle-
man took out a patent for an improved parchment, but
the excise interfered, and insisted that the manufac-
ture was paper, and liable to the duty. The question
came on for trial in the Court of Exchequer ; but after
a long investigation it was impossible to say whether
the article was paper or not, and a verdict having passed
for the Crown, a new trial was granted on account of the
doubt in which the matter was involved. There was a
spelling-book published, the material being cloth so
closely woven that few persons were able to detect
whether it was the produce of the loom or the paper mill.
Was it not, too, an anomaly that cotton waste, which was
formerly carted away as refuse, now that it was employed
in the making of paper, should be subject to a dray six
times the amount of the,. which was charged upon the
cotton as it came originally from America I (Hear, hear.)
He would not advocate any measure that should endanger
the public credit, but he could not forget that if they were
under an engagement to the public creditor, they were
also under a long standing engagement to the paper ma-
nufacturers and the public in reference to this tax, which
ought to be discharged. The paper tax and the soap tax
were imposed together as war taxes in the time of Queen
Anne. A. few years ago the soap duty was remitted, and
he hoped the Chancellor of the Exchequer would be pre-
pared to carry out the remainder of the pledge of the
Government of Queen Anne by abolishing the paper
duty also.
The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER regarded
the paper duty as one of those taxes which, as soon as a
faveurah'e opportunity arose, ought to be erased from
the statute-book. Looking at the operation of the tax in a
moral, commercial, and literary point of view, he should
be glad if he could feel it consistent with his duty to re-
commend that it be at once remitted ; but, like all other
remissions of taxation, it must depend on the position of
the minister in reference to the steteof the public finances
at the time. He could not ascent to the resolution as
proposed by the right hon. gentleman. To one part of
it he could offer so objection, though he could see no
great use in making ouch a declaration. He agreed with
the right hon. gentleman that the maintenance of the
excise on paper as a permanent source of revenue would
be impolitic ; but he could cot agree with him that such
financial arrangements might be made as would enable
Parliament to dispense with that tax. By carrying such
a resolution the house would hamper and cripple the
Government in a manner which he did not think fair or
politic. (Hear, hear ) The paper tax was not the only
tax which in the two great sources of revenue derived
from indirect taxation required consideration and revi-
sion. Whether they looked at the customs or the inland
revenues, notwithstanding the great changes and im-
provements which had been made in the mode of raising
the means for meeting the public exeenditure during the
last 10 years—he might say the last 25 yettrs—in these
two branches, there was in both much that required
consideration and great room for improvement. There
were many dutiesia the curt one that did not pay for the
cost of collection. No one would say that was a state
of affairs which it was desirable permanently to main-
tain. (Hear,) There were claims too in connexion with
the customs revenue, in reference to bonding, which re-
quired consideration and revision. In the sister branch
cf indirect revenue, the inland taxes, there were like-
wise many subjects the consideration of which could not
be delayed, and the revision of which was much re-
quired, including the whole question of drawbacks and
credits. The drawback on paper called for serious at•
tention nod alteration, and he was not prepared to say
that the tax itself was not entitled, if not to immediate,
at least to early consideration. But the subjects were
so numerous that it would become the duty of the
Government to subject both these branches of revenue
to an early and searching examination. In the course
of the recess the subject would he taken into considera•
tion, and he hoped when Parliament met for the next
session to be in a position to offer some suggestion to
the house which he trusted would meet with approval.
But he hoped the house would nos hamper the Govern-
ment in the course they intended to pursue by passing a
resolution which could not but cripple their efforts to im-
prove and to simplify that part of the revenue which was
derived from indirect taxation. One hon. gentleman
who had spoken, and who looked to the remission of this
tax more as a matter of course than lie thought circum-
stances justified hien in doing, had indicated a reduction
of the public expenditure as the means by which any de•
ficiency arising from such remission might be supplied.
He (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) had on former
occasions urged upon the house the importance of bear•
ing in mind that great reductions in the public establish-
ments could not be accomplished in a moment. (Hear.)
In the naval and military establishments especially any
reduction of importance required a long course of pre-
paration, and preparation arising from circumstances
that were not mere circumstances of routine. (Hear.)
Tne public expenditure of the country—as he had before
remarked—depended upon the pubic policy, and it was
only by the establishment of a policy that they could
ultimately and considerably affect the expenditure either
way. (Rear.) He hoped the policy pursued by her
Majesty's Government in respect to their foreign rela-
tions had not been of such a character as could give
the house any reason to suppose that they were anxious
to encourage any vast expenditure in the naval and
military establishments ; and that if by a fair and well-
considered scheme of economy they could find the means
for a remission of taxation they would be indisposed to
adopt it. (Hear.) When circumstances in due course
would allow such reduction of expenditure no one would
mere gladly hail such a state of affairs than himself, and
no one would be more delighted to propose that reduc-
tien in the public burdens which would be the natural
consequence. But he hoped the house would not ham-
per the Government by passing a resolution respecting
any item of taxation upon which it was obvious that
they could not act. It was quite impossible that they
could at the present moment deal with the paper duty.
What might be their position next year it was impossible
to say. Why, then, should they seek to bind the Go-
vernment in respect to that or any other particular tax?
There were various considerations which must operate
with the Government when they came to deal with
the finances of the ensuing year before they could
decide upon a question of this nature. Under
any circumstances it would be impolitic and inexpe-
dient, and practically most unfair to a Govern-
ment which did not seek to conceal its general
opinion that this was a tax which ought not to form a
permanent source of revenue—(hear)—and which they
would be glad of the opportunity to remit, to fetter them
by a resolution of this kind. (Hear.) He trusted,
therefore, that the right hon. gentleman would be satin-
question fairly before the
fled with having brought the
house and the country, and that he would not press the
resolution to a division. (Cheers.)
Mr. BRIGHT did not complain of the right hon.
gentleman's speech, for it ias much the sort of speech
that any Chancellor of the Exchequer might hive been
expected to make. His right hon. friend (11Ir. Gibson)
must feel satisfied that his case was now so good that
no attempt was made to reply to it. (Hear.) He
thought the Chancellor of the Exchequer attached too
much importance to the danger of hampering a Govern-
ment by a resolution of this kind—for he thought if the
right hon. gentleman would look back for a few years
only he would find an instance where his right hon.
friend induced him and many of his friends to vote for
a similar resolution with respect to the newspaper stamp
duty, from which no such danger resulted, and the effect
of which resolution was to bring about the remission of
the duty. (Hear.) His right hon. friend's object now was
to put on record in like manner the opinion of the house
that when the state of the Treasury would permit it
the Chancellor of the Exchequer cf the day, and he (Mr.
Bright) hoped it would be the right hon. gentleman—
(hear, hear)—might take this particular tax as the first.
to be got rid of. (Cheers.) The right hon. gentleman
had referred to the customs duties, but he was no more
anxious than his right hon. friend (hlr. Gibson) or him-
self to abolish the obnoxious and unproductive duties to
which be alluded. It was easy, however, to show that
the abolition of a tax of a million in the customs branch
of the revenue would not afford anything like the relief
to the public that this excise duty of the same amount
would give. The paper duty WAS a tax which operated
as a code of pains end penalties on 300,000 or 400,000
persons who were engaged in carrying on a useful and
important occupation. He did not believe it was pos-
sible for those who had had nothing to do with the ex-
cise to form an idea of the intolerable nuisance of having
an exciseman constantly about their premises. (Hear,
hear) They were t.ld that they were living in a frees
country ; but if they attempted to manu'aeture paper,
excisemen might come in, go through their premises
whenever they pleased, and nthfere with all they did.
That was not what freeman in a free country ought to
be exposed to. There were 300,000 or 400,000 persons
engaged in that trade who had a right to come and ask
for a remission of this duty. Notmtly could say that
there was any trade more important with reference to
instruction, tee rot vaneement of the people, and to good
order, than the trade cf making bsoks and newspapers,
and) et, after relieving the cotton manufacturer from
a small tax, you c tme upon tide trade with a tax cf a
most onerous characti r. o.le fact had been related by
an eminent publi-her, v:z., that in 20 years he had paid
80 0001. to where and autheso, and in the same time he
had paid 50,0001. to the Government in the shape of
paper duty. Aus lion remitted on each of the duties on
tea and sugar would not he half the relief that this
single million of duty on paper would be. He knew a
respectable paper manufacturer in the neighbourhood
of 13miniugharn who paid 120/, a year in wages to
men whose whole duty was to wait continually
on the exciseman. With regard to the question
of school books, there was a fact be wished to mention,
which, if the hon. gentleman the member for the uatest;•
versity of Dublin was present, he could bearf hie -
loony to, that out of every thousand school books pub.
lished by that university, and there were none better—
not leas than 250, er one-fourth of the whole, were
seizal by the exciseman for the duty on paper. There
was one single fact more he wished to mention before be
concluded. His right Lon. friend bad referred to a