The Sun.
London, England, 1845-02-18 00:00:00

to them and to the colonial gentlemen ? To all he
said, " Support me, and I'll support you." To the colo-
nial interests in that House, he said, " Support me on
the corn-law question, and I'll support you on the
sugar duties."—(Cries of " Hear, hear.") To the
agriculturists his arguments wero equally potent.—
(Hear, hear.) Now, with regard to the reductions that
the Hon. Baronet had made on the articles of timber
and sugar, he (Mr. Roebuck) would deny that any
benefit had resulted to the country by the reduction OR
the latter, because if the duty had been equalised on
sugar produced in all parts of the world, the same
benefits would have followed, while the duty would not
have been lessened. Now, he would like to see how
the Hon. Baronet would explain upon what principle he
had let in the Venezuela slave-grown sugar, or the
enormous amount of slave-grown cotton.—(Hear, hear.)
Could it be possible that these productions, being the
result of slave labour, did not touch his feelings
in favour of the slaves in those places as
well as in other parts of the world ?—(Hear.)
The Right Hon. Baronet had lost 13,000/. by his changes
in the fiscal regulations as regarded sugar, part of
which' went into the pockets of the West India planters
and alarge portion was altogether thrown away. And
why thrown away ? Because it was non-productive.
And so with timber. Canadian timber was not only
dearer but greatly worse in quality, and upon 'it there
was a loss of 900,000/. He (Mr. Roebuck) knew this
subject well, and if the Right Hon. Baronet and other
gentlemen would go through the calculations they
might see it now, as no doubt they would at some later
period feel it.—(Hear, hear.) Canada produced its own
timber well fitted for the mists of ships, but timber
came from the Baltic at a cheaper rate and of a finer
quality for all the purposes of building. But what would
be the result ? 900,0001. would be lost to the Exchequer
and yet the people would have no better timber, They
were about to impose upon the country an income-
tax, and what was their justification ? Why this. That
they were about to favour the country with an alteration
of the fiscal duties. He (Mr. Roebuck) said that those
alterations were fallacious in principle, bad in calculation,
and led to no desirable result. He bad already reviewed
what the Right Hon. Baronet called the necessity for
these changes, and they had heard the Right Hon. the
Chancellor of the Exchequer say that they were neces-
sary in order to avert national bankruptcy. But why
remit the duties on sugar and timber, and preserve to
the country this inquisitorial tax ? He left upon the
Right Honourable Baronet the onus of proving his
(Mr. Roebuck's) statements to be incorrect. Be-
fore adverting to another part of- the question he
could not help remarking that there was a-
very great deal of art in the scheme propounded by the
Right Hon. Baronet. There was a something to mollify
Manchester and Glasgow, and there was an attempt to
soothe the Noble Lord (Lord Howick) by the alteration
upon coal.—(Laughter.) Sol far from agreeing with
the Noble Lord, that no exports should be taxed, that
might be the newest principle ; however, he (Mr. Roe-
buck) thought that the exports of the country were
those which ought to be the first to be taxed, inasmuch
as their customers, not themselves, consumed them. He
considered that the Right Hon. Baronet had completely
failed to make out his case. He had not established one
reason for his changes. He (Mr. Roebuck) would say
nothing of the auction duty, but he certainly thought
that imposts pressing more severely upon the industry of
the country might have been removed. The Right Hon.
Baronet had, he believed, remitted that tax because of
the enormous expense of collecting it. One word
more about the remission of taxation. The Right Hon.
Baronet had remitted the duty on glass. This would
certainly benefit the rich, by lowering the cost of their
chandeliers ; but the windows of the poor would remain
untouched by it. The present step was in the right
direction, and he thanked the Right Hon. Baronet for it.
It was an earnest of a future time, when the monstrous
monopolies of the country would be levelled to the
ground. Let him not be mistaken in the resolution he
was about to propose. He proposed to leave out of the
resolution the words " professions, trades, and offices,"
not for the purpose of exempting them altogether, but
of subjecting them to a regular system of taxation, such
as he had described.
Sir GEO. GREY said that in her Majesty's speech, at
the beginning of this session, it was recommended to
Parliament to consider whether it might not be expedient
to continue for a limited period the tax on property, and
to consider also whether those taxes which pressed
more heavily upon the energies and the industry
of the country should not be removed. The Right
Hon. Baronet, in strict accordance with the recommen-
dation in that speech, had laid before the House his pro-
posed alterations. In the speech which he had addressed
to the House on Friday last, after reviewing the state
of the country, and his views with regard to the reduc-
tion of taxation, he stated his confident expectation that,
in making a proposition for the continuance of the in-
come- tax for a period of three years, he should be after-
wards enabled to dispense with the tax altogether. The
Hon. and Learned Gentleman who had just sat down
had informed the House, with a gesture of disdain and
contempt, which he granted would be well merited if the
result should bear him out, that the tax would not be
limited but permanent. He (Sir George Grey)
trusted that the Right Honourable Baronet, or
one of his colleagues, would give the House
the grounds for the confident expectation advanced that
the tax would not be renewed, and for their desire that
that House would confirm, in consequence, the Right
Hon. Baronet's resolution. He (Sir George Grey) had
opposed the tax three years ago, hut he was prepared
then to allow the imposition of the tax for a further
term, provided that he had a certainty of its being again
left to the House at the expiry of
.that time whether it
should be further continued or not. He could see no-
thing more reasonable than that Government should
propose its continuance at this time, with a view to the
removal of other taxes which pressed more heavily upon
the industry of the country; but looking to the
speech of the Right Hon. Baronet, he, fur one, could
not discover the grounds for his confident anticipation
that the tax would at an after period be removed.—
(Hear, hear, from Mr. Roebuck.) He did not mean to go
through the statement of the Right Hon. Baronet in
detail, but he could not, like him, entertain the solitary
expectation that, at the end of three years, the revenue
would be in that state to enable him to dispense with
the income-tax, and he believed that, if the proposition
of the Right Hon. Baronet were acceded to by the
House, it would be a gratuitous sacrifice of a large
amount of property without giving the country any
equivalent for the sacrifice. He might assume that the
Right Hon. Baronet was sincere in his desire to exclude
from the markets of this country the sugar of those coun-
tries which encourage slave labour. But he asked, in the
event of such an increase in the consumption of that
article to pay the loss in duty, from whence the supply
was to come? Were their colonies to supply 34,000
hogsheads, which the Right Hon. Baronet took credit
fur to cover his deficit of 3,000/. ? He (Sir G. Grey)
doubted whether the colonies could supply so much. He
thought that the revenue would be sacrificed, and that
the price would not be lowered lid. to the consumer, as
had been promised by the Right Hon. Baronet, and the
result would be to benefit the pockets of the gentlemen
who supported the monopoly.—(Hear.) He believed
that the Right Hon. Baronet had no confident expectation
of excluding from the markets the sugar from the slave:
growing countries, and, therefore, let them not hypo.
critically assume that they could act on that principle,
but let them at once sweep away the distinctions that
had been hitherto preserved, and equalise the duties
upon them.—(Hear, hear.) Any other mode of dealing
with the question would but have the effect of making
eeven more injurious monopolies than those that now
existed, and he should, therefore, support the resolution
of the Hon. Member for Manchester, that no settlement
of the question could be 'considered but such as involved
an equalisation of all the duties on that article. With
regard to the amendment of the Hon. and Learned
Member for Bath, he (Sir- G. Grey) trusted, for one,
that the Right Hon. Baronet might supply some ground
for his belief that he should be able to remove the tax at
the end of three years. He (Sir G. Grey) did not wish
to see experiments or modifications tried upon it, for his
own opinion was that the more obnoxious the tax the
more likely they were to get rid of it..
The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER said
that differing materially in opinion as to the results of
these alterations from the different gentlemen who had
spoken, there were at least some points in which there
appeared a great uniformity of opinion between them.
The Noble Lord did not object to a continuance of the
income-tax •, the Hon. Gentleman did not object to it ;
the Hon. and Learned Member did not object to it, only
he wished to introduce modifications into it. He agreed
with the Right Hon. Baronet who had last spoken,
that these modifications would only render the
measure more obnoxious and altogether inoperative.
Upon this point he thought they were generally agreed,
that in the course of the year it would be necessary to
increase the expenditure of the country by the amount of
1,200,0001, in order to keep up those establishments
which could not be neglected without the greatest detri-
ment and danger to the country.—(Hear, hear.) But
the Right Hon. Gentleman who spoke last asked upon
what ground his Right Hon. Friend anticipated that, at
the period for which he had called for the continuance of
the income-tax, he would be able to repeal it ?—(Hear,
hear.) Now he (the Chancellor of- the Exchequer)
would tell him that the Ministers grounded that anti-
cipation upon the experience of the past ; and that if the
establishments of the country were kept upon the same
footing as last year, they could, with perfect safety,
abandon the income-tax, at present.—(Hear, hear.) That
tax was imposed in 1842. It was then imposed to meet
the expenditure, which exceeded the revenue, and pro-
duced a deficiency. It was now proposed to continue it
for the purpose of meeting an increased expenditure, in
the necessity of which all seemed to agree, and at the
same time to relieve the country of burdens which
pressed upon industry and commerce. It must be remem-
bered that when this income-tax was first submitted to the

House, it was for the purpose of covering a large deficiency
which then existed, and to release from burden a num-
ber of articles which were at that time subject to bur-
dens, by which commerce and industry were restricted.
It was then supposed that by removing that taxation, a
spring would be given to the industry of the people—so
that ater an interval, which might last five years, but
which, as his Right Hon. Friend (Sir R. Peel) at the
time stated would probably be no more than three—the
industry and commerce of the country would recover,
and the income-tax might be dispensed with. And what
was the situation of the revenue at the two periods,
when the tax was imposed, and at the expiration of the
three years ? He would refer for an answer to the ac-
counts of the revenue in the throe years. In the ac-
counts of the, year ending the 10th of October, 1842,
the ordinary revenue of the country, that arising from
Customs, Excise, the Assessed Taxes, the Post-office,
and the Land-tax, amounted, as near as possible, to
forty-seven millions of money. The measure sub-
mitted to Parliament in that year withdrew from the
ordinary revenue an amount of taxation above 140,0001.
of annual income.—(Hear, hear.) But, on the 10th of
October, 1844, the accounts show that those same
taxes, which had been reduced by the amount of-140,0001,
produced, not as in 1842, nearly forty-seven millions