The Sun.
London, England, 1859-07-19 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, TUESDAY EVENING, J ITLY 19, 1859.

time *mild tome When some proposal on the subject
Would he Made. f refer to What is called the system
of malt credits. It is known to a large portion of
the committee that there is a peculiarity in the col-
lection of the malt and hop duties. I will not toueh
upon the latter, because the case is peculiar and the amount
small; I will deal exclusively with the duties on malt, and
speaking roughly there is a credit of nearly six months
which is given to the maltster by the public, the effect of
which is that he makes his malt, disposes of his malt, and is
paid for his malt in general, or at least if he is not, it is his
own fault, before he is called on to pay the duty, or, in
other words, to a considerable extent the public find capital
for the maltsters. , (Hear, hear.) This, with the slight
exception of the hop duties, is an exceptional privilege. The
distiller of spirits, directly after the spirits are gauged and
the gauging officer has completed his round, is called upon
to pay the duty, and pays it as soon as the charge is made
upon him. A delay of five or six weeks is all that takes place
in the payments of the distillers of spirits and the makers
of paper. The Government give them no credit, but they
require them to pay the duty to the revenue officer when he
presents his account. In the case of the malt distiller there
is a clear term of 18 weeks, which, added to the other six

weeks, makes a delay of nearly six months. In former times
it was felt that these questions had an importance in rela-
tion to the system of protection and the dependence of the
agriculturist upon the prices that barley fetched in the
market. It was thought, and with some colour of reason,
that this system of supplying capital to the man who buys
barley from the farmer had a tendency to augment the
price of barley to the purchasers. It certainly did tend to
break up the malt trade, and to bring many competitors
into the market. But we have, I hope, long out-lived
the day when any consideration of that kind, arising
out of artificial interests, either could, would, or ought to
be entertained. (Hear, hear.) The system of finding
capital for traders on the part of the public is in
principle a bad system, and being bad it has also this second
bad feature, that it is an exceptional system, being a
privilege granted to some and not to others. Therefore
the Government are of opinion that the time has come
when this system may be safely modified—(hear, hear)—l
don't say abolished altogether, because a sudden abolition of
such a system would derange the trade, and run the risk of
hampering the operations of private parties, whose resources
might not be large, and that would be extremely objection-
able. My proposal is, therefore, to deal with the malt
credits, but to deal with them in the mildest manner. (A
laugh.) Of the 18 weeks we propose to take away six, leaving
12. I don' tsay that there might not be a further measure in
the same direction at a future time, and after matters have
been adjusted to the present change; but this I do say,
that I am most unwilling to give grounds for complaint, and
in proposing to abridge these sixweeks from the creditgiven
in the case of malt we also propose that you should incur
the very small expense of allowing the maltster a discount
at the rate of 4 per cent. on the payments to which he would
be liable under the proposed system, so that the shortening
his credit would be a matter limited in extent, and as far as
possible reduced to the condition of a banking transaction.
Of course in future years there would be no operation
of discount, and the credit would stand reduced to whatever
,Parliament might determine. I will net trouble the com-
mittee with the intricacies of the arrangements under which
the malt duties are collected, and under which the year is
divided into certain periods, the malt is gauged, and the
duty charged and collected from the maltster. But the
effect of reducing six weeks from the credit allowed to the
maltster will be to bring into the Exchequer—and not only
that, but to bring into the Exchequer before the Ist of April
next—the sum of £780,000, which would otherwise not find
its way there before the following financial year. In point
of fact, the public have £2,500,000 oat on loan to the malt-
ster, of which I propose to take up, by a resolution I shall
submit, a sum something short of £BOO,OOO. Well, that
is a deduction, as far as it goes, from the rather formidable
figure of the deficiency that we have to supply. That de-
ficiency, it will be recollected, I stated at £4,867,000, and
the deduction of £780,000, will make it stand at some-
' thing over £1,000,000. That sum we propose to raise by
the augmentation of the income-tax. (Cheers.) The present
rate of the income-tax is sd. in the pound. We propose an
addition of 4d. in the pound. (Murmurs, and " Hear.")
An addittion of 4d. in the :pound would yield something
over £4,000,000 of money. In making an addition of that
kind it will be necessary of course to re-introduce the dis-
tinction between incomes above £l5O and incomes under
£150; because that distinction was originally introduced
when the rate was 7d., and was allowed to drop when it
fell to sd. ; but whets it goes above 7d. there cannot be a
doubt that the distinction must be re-introduced. I think
it will also be the feeling and disposition of the committee
that any additional rate laid on incomes between £lOO and
£l5O should be rather lightly laid in reference to sudden calls
of this kind, so as to give what I may call the turn in their
favour. (Hear.) Therefore, what I propose is that the 4d.
laid upon the general mass of the income-tax payers should
stop at incomes of £l5O, and that in lieu of 4d. in the pound
paid by incomes above £l5O the rate of 13d. in the pound
should be laid upon incomes under £l5O. But I must frankly
admit that my proposal is that the whole of this addition
to the income-tax, which is voted fsr the service of
the year, shall be made applicable to the service of the year
by being charged on the first half-yearly payment. (" Oh.")
'lt is, I take it, the clear sense of the committee that on thts
occasion we ought to pay our way. (Hear, hear.) It is also
the clear sense of the committee that we ought to pay our
way without resorting to indirect taxation. (Cheers.)
Having done what I am able towards a limited reductioa
of the deficiency, I still find £4,000,000 of money staring me
in the face. And if lam to have that money for the service
of the year, it must be in the exchequer before the Ist of
April, nor can it be by any means that I am aware of in
the exchequer before the Ist of April unless it is made
leviable in one single payment, on the first assessment or
charge, after the resolution shall be adopted by the house.
(Murmurs and interruption.) I wish to explain to the com-
mittee, if they will hear me,
exactly how the payments will
stand. I wish to show the committee what it is the tax-
gatherer will ask for, the next time he shows what I sup-
pose we must call his ill-omened visage at the taxpayer's
door. The effect of my proposal is to place an addition of
11d. in the pound upon all incomes under £l5O, and upon
all above £l5O an addition of 61d., or at the rate annually
of 13d. on incomes above £150., But the first half-
yearly payment of the taxpayers whose income is under £l5O
a year will be 4d. in the pound. The remaining liability for
income-tax for 1859-60 will stand exactly as it does now, at
21d. for both classes. So that the first half-yearly payment
would be 61d. on incomes above £l5O, and 4d. on incomes
under £l5O, or at the rate of 13d. in the year on incomes
ove(£lso, and Bd. on incomes under £l5O. The result
would be that the tax would yield £4,340,000. Adding that
to the sum of £780,000 which the malt credits will bring in,
the total will be £5,120,000. Now, the deficit, as I have
already stated to the committee, is £4,867,000, and deduct-
ing that sum from the ways and means which have thus
become available, there remains a surplus of £253,000. It
will naturally be observed that this surplus is very small,
but I should wish to say a word to the committee on that
point. I have already pointed out to the committee that
there is a charge of £400,000 which we must be prepared to
meet in January, which legally falls to the charge of this
year, but falls to it by an accident, and which really belongs
in the ordinary arrangement of our finances not to this but
the following year. That being so, Ido not consider that 1
am bound to raise taxes for such a sum as that. The whole
question is whether it is a sum that can be conveniently met
out of the public balances, and if the committee will permit
me I will just state how the public balances have stood
lately, how they now stand, and what they are likely to be
at the close of the financial year. (Hear.) On June 30,1859,
the balances for the financial fear were £5,016,000. But
on April 1, 18b9, at the commencement of the financial year,
they stood at £7,789,000. In the course of the year it is
calculated that there will be' an addition to the balances
from a probable excess of repayments over outgoings for
public works, a sum of £500,000. The surplus revenue
is estimated at £253,000, making altogether £8,542,000.
From that you will have to deduct £2,000,000 Ex-
chequer bonds paid off on the Bth of May, in conse-
quence of the dissolution of Parliament and there being
no opportunity to consider whether any provision ought to
be made for them. Deducting these £2,000,000 the pro-
bable balances on the Ist of April, 1860, will be £6,542,000.
That is an ample amount, and more than is absolutely ne-
cessary for the coming year, because the subsequent quarter
will be relieved in respect to this payment to no less an ex •
tent than £1,000,000 in consequence of the lapse of a large
portion of annuities. That, I think, is the statement which
I have to make to the committee. I shall not, of course,
ask the committee to come to any material vote to-night.
It will be for the committee to consider when they will like
to resume the discussion of the subject. If I anticipate
their wishes rightly, I would desire to choose a very early
day—(hear)—in reference to the state of the weather, of the
session, and some other considerations that are better to be
reflected on than named. (Laughter.) I shall only pro-
pose to-night a formal vote of Ways and Mean's, and I
shall lay on the table the resolutions having reference to the
Income-tax and the malt credits. Now let me add another
word before I sit down. I know I have made a great de-
mand on the generosity and patriotism of this committee;
but don't be repelled from considering that demand by the
fact, which we all know, that it is disagreeable to us indi-
vidually, and does not tend to promote our popularity as
a Parliament, to augment the burdens of the people. Look
at the charge which is incurred, and the estimates you have
voted. (Hear; hear.) Consider, if I may be /permitted to
make the appeal, that neither the honour nor responsibility
of these estimates are mainly ours. Our duty has mainly
been to take over the estimates framed for us by our prede-
cessors, but yet we have taken them over not in the mere
discharge of formal official duty, but with a ready warmth
and a conscientious assent. (Hear.) But there stand the es-
timates. There is the charge you.have placed on the public
Treasury. How will you meet it ? Do not allow yourselves
to bo swayed by considerations of what might be merely
agreeable. Ask yourselves whether you have reallyperformed
your duty by simply fixing the expenditure of the year, as
has been done in the main and is likely to be entirely
done so, at a sum of £69,000,000. There is another duty
not less transparently clear—namely, that you should make
adequate provision to meet that charge ; and, instead of
ascribing to the great English people a childish impatience
to meet necessary demands, with which they were never
chargeable, I, on the contrary; shall rely on their unyield-
ing, inexhaustible energy, and generous patriotism, and