The Statesman.
London, England, 1818-04-21 00:00:00

THE §TATiScAti.

&Witted Othrsley. 'lthed2robilirtogslid, orai'
_91110.0001.. After, 'timsdirs69o4oo9l.• bpi
,thmseastler a the II hits .14 liereewthilßsetviros
stained hetweitss'7 dad otrojbooi. to bill peOßAkiti
the ...Aker swim ANtliteltleatove Iw hie AIM j
icrestiog Ibis sew Mock Ives to •sfrall titert2l9 tq
subscribers of converting it into the Si s • , the
present price of which was 03 per coot. 11. did nit
think the-aloe of the new stock was likely to fail
below that amount. It was set merely. the saes Of.
one per titist. which was made applicable, by
scheme, to the redemption of the whole sem borrow,
ed, *ben model. par; the Commissioners having a
discretion th 'exercise with respect to the extent ti
which their. purchases, under circumstances othemisi
fa etodrable, might be carried. They had a fell power
vested in them of acting spon'either food as the in-
terests of the Toblic should 'require. The total
atonest of new, stock created fog the service of the
year would be '34,900,0001. Of 'which 27,270,0001.
twotild be vested in the 34 pee casts. and the re..
Osiuder its the 3 per cents. The differeace le the
'rate Of interest would be about 153,0001. In exa-
iajoiqt..tb• interest as receivable upon Exchequer
'Bills at present, and whet their conversion into stock
would prodeco, the whole charge would appear Dot
to .exceed 31. Ss. *id per seat. a very small sem
*bon viewed is etiference to the magnitude of the
traosactioo. ,Ffe had now to express his hope that
the Committee would be inclined with Ilia to tap-
port this.aew plea of issue by a measure perfectly
in confoperity with the principles of that general
view of ear. Isaac's which had been developed in
the year 1613. • The 1nc..... which the adoption of
this measure would teed to upon vier Loan of
30,000,0001. wield be about 1,525,0001. He flat-
tered himself that he was entitled to congratulate
the.. Committee upon the condition, tweeted to the
plan for raising money which be bad no* endeavour-
ed to explain, as compared with the terms upon
which any farmer Loan had been negociated. It
would be remembered by the Committee that accord-
ing to the plan which he bad submitted in the year
1813, the Sinking Fund was, to a certain extent,
made applicable to the immediate service of the year,
whenever circumstances should arise to reader such
a measure expedient. it was his inter.: ion, if nothing
preferable should jots sepo,,terl, to propose that it
should be so charged this year, as t mek? ge•td
whatever deficiencies might appear spun the fullest
compariseis of the expenditure of the Hotessee.—
In the year 1813, he recollected to have held out to
the House and the Country the prospect of realising
a fund of 100,000,0001. Ile had the happit..-ss of I
now stating that this fend amounted to 01,00,1,0001.
of which 84,000,0001. were stOssertient to the par.
poses of the Act of 1813. The manner, however, in I
which hc intended to apply it would not iuterfere
with the operations of the Cr.m:nissiutiers in the re-
daction of capital debt. This part of his plan, how-
ever, he should reserve for consideration on a future
day. He should now rather choose to call the afire-
lion of the Committee to flits improvement- in the
different breaches of our Revenue. The favoLrahle
rise in the amount of Excise Duties ;lad led him ti,
estimate them at the sum of 3,500,0001., anti the
total excess of produce, as COtTlittlfed With the *ear
1815, was 515,6001., or more thou ten per Cent. on
any former return.. 1.. the feat q mrlet, as com-
pered with the corresponding quarter of the former
year, there was an improvement of I`lll,onel. in th.
Racist. War Duties. By a fair examination it would
appear that there was a proportionate increase in the
Customs, the la6t quarter exhibiting an excess, slot.
withstanding the anticipatiuts of hetneeu boo,oool.
and 6n0,0001. Seger Duties, Which were paid in dor.
ing the p.eceding quarter. Upon all these different
views, he conceived that he was justified its catculat.
nig upon a surplus in the Consolidated Fei!d. He
bad, however, for the present, abstained from any
charges upon it, in the hope that the scheme of finance
*which he had now submitted would meet with the
approbation of the House, and aliord patisfactio• to
the Country. The Right lion. Gentleman concluded
by moving his first Resolution with respect to a new
anhecriptioe to a 3i per Cent. Fend.
Mr. BROUGHAM wished to make a few °Mgr-
vations oo what had falters from the Right lion.
Gentleman, although, considering the great multi-
plicity of the details into which he had necessarily
entered, it could suet he expected that he should fol-
low him throughout the whole of his speech. These
were, in his opinion,' Many things in the statement
of the Right lion. Gentleman, and in the principle
on which he founded that statee.int, that, in his
(Mr. Brougham's) opinion, had an obvious tendency
to conceall from the Committee what appeared to him
to be the sum and substance of the measure now
proposed. The great and new Plan of Finance now
broached to the Howe, seemed to him (Mr. B.)
to resole, itself Into Ibis (and if he misunderstood it
be should be happy to be set right), that • class &Agit
existing of somewhere about fourteen millions, that ,
deficit must someway or other be supplied; and this
gnat and new Plan consisted in someway or ether
borrowing the sem necessory—in contracting, in
fact, a new Loan at three and a half per cent.; the
interest of which (to be charged on the Sinking
Plated) would "sweat to nearly 1,200,0001.—
Whatever .might be the .details of the proposition,
that, he coaceleed, to be the result, or, in vulgar
language, the upshot of it. Now, after three or
four yarn of peace, he, for one, could not consider
that a state of things iu which such a proceeding be-
came aeamsery, was at all flattering. The Right
Wearable Gentlest'', indeed, appeared to enter-
itis very sanguine hopes 'pistolled on a comparison.
of the receipts of ono bronchia- the Revenge in the
last quarter,' with the'corresponding quarter of 1817.
Whether it was probable that these hopes mould be
Nand, was a question into which he would not then
stop to enquire; but the fact evidently was, that
After three years of peace, en far were we from being
able to make the two ends of our Finances meet, that
• clear deficit existed to the amount which he had
already stated ; end that the means resorted to
to supply that deficiency were the old war means
of a Loso, the interest of which was to be paid,
not on the old war system, but by charging it on
the Sinking Fond. On this view of the subject,
he confessed that he felt it to be wise and prudent
to withhold, until he should hi further advised, any
congratulations to the Committee on the State of the
, Country. The Invention of the new Stock of three
I sad a ball per Beat. was another atettepeeeltirit)

with his *MOM illfohltedow, he Mast be allowed to
Willa odd Ms felicitations. This Steck, ercording to
the ' Honourable Geestleman's!eopresetteation,
4
61, .ie .Y th/nodltd for a kind of half-say
itze
t heanionet iliteeste and be per ceets. in that
'writer siewnillidi, whitli the Right Honourable'
. Gest/masa seemed coafideatly to anticipate they
would seeker at no ihrry distant -period. The Right
Roo. Gentleman itioteitelued hopes, that at se dis-
tant (kyr he might lasreesbled to kohl. the holders of -
&tread Ate per casts. to *auger their stock to a
fend bearing a lowerinterest ; sad said, that if he
hod allowed the Stocks to remain as hitherto, divided
only loth three, four, end five per cents., he should 1
ham found it dilficalt to effect hie purpose; trod that
there berlag been hitherto only the three per cents.
into which the Amami five per cents. could be com-
meted, he halt deelsed this stew plan of • three and a
'half per cent. for the future accoromodathin of the
holden of four sad live per coots. He else had de-
clared, that theedmatoges of his sew plats in this
respect were as plain as possible; for that if a holder
of five per costs. were required to oommete his stock
for a stock bearing a lower Interest, he would rather
change it ; he (Mr. Brougham) supposed the Right I
Hos. Gentleman was sheet to my, for three and a
half per cent. stock than for three per cent. ; but no
—be would rather &sage it for three and a half per
cent. than for fear: And the reason assigned Was,
`that the bolder of 6se per cents. dm at oat* coat.
meting his stook for three and a half per cent.,
world feel confident that it would newer be reduced
lower. For his own part, if he had the good fortune
to be a large holder of Ike per tent. stock, and if he
were asked whether he would commute it for stock
at four, or stock at three and a half per emit..he con.
hosed that he should think the argument used to
persuade trim, to prefer the three and a half per mt.,'
wiry metapisysical. He would beg to hove the
four per cent. stock in the first instance, and to
talk about the three arid a half at leisure—
knowing at least this, that while ho retained
the four per cent. stock, he should be enjoying a
bait per cent, more than he would have done had he
embraced the other branch of the alternative. But
on whet ground was any holder of 5 per cent. stock
to entertain a confidence that if his stock were re.
duced to three and a half per cent. it would never be
reduced still more?—The same cause, namely, the
rise of the Fends, which would give the Chancellor
of the Exchequer the power of inducing the bolder
of 5 per cents. to accept ..f a similar amount of
stock in the 5 per cents., might, if progressive, en-
, able him to induce the holder of stock in the three
land a half per cent. to accept of a similar amount of
stock at a leas interest. lie was at a loss, therefore,
I tea see what temptation there was to the holders of 5
I per cents. (in the everit of circumstances warranting I
I a.. change) tr, take these three gild o half per cents.
I iit preference to 4 per cents.: and if there was no
Isuch lemptation, he wished to know with what
public benefi- this new and grand financial inven-
tion was pregnant ?—He could not close the few
observations which he had taken the liberty to
m 'kr on this subject, wi bout entering his so.
:Ann protest against that put of the Right Ho.
n..u.able Gentlemen's Budget, by which it was
.again proposed to raise a tam comparatively paltry
sod contemptible, by way of Lottery; he begged the
Con.mittee to remark, in addition to all the objec.
toms that had so long milted to this way of raising
money, a peculiarity in the present instance—a gross
stud paipable inconsistency in tne two parts of the
Budget, the Espences, and the Ways and Means.
When his lion. Friend, the Member for Worcester.
shire, so forcibly argued the abandonment of the
Lottery, the Right lion. Gentleman had not a word
to say in reply. His answer was a mere sobrogoge
to enable him to escape from the effect of his Hon.
Friend's observations, and to cling to this favourite
mode of Finance. The Right lion. Gentleman ad-
mitted that it wis liable to all the objections which
had been adduced against it by his lion. Friend ; he
did not deny its immoral and pernicious tendency; but
all that he urged was, Government could not atord
to give it op, and thus to do what his conscience told
him ought to be done, with a due regard to the mo-
rals and happiness of the community. Now, how-
ever, while still clinging to this method of raking
money, there w,ts to be found in the same Budget,
in which it was again brought forward, an item of
400,0001. to l‘e paid to the Spanish Government for
the relinquishment of the Slave Trick?, es a fit sa-
crifice to that justice and morality, which by the
grossest inconsistency, the proposition for raising a ,
sum of money by way of Lottery tended to trample
under foot. Ile could not conclude the desultory
observations with which lie had troubled tfie Com-
mittee, without entering his protest against this pro.
peskiest ; for althoegh he knew that there were other
Honourable Membibrs who would do so with greater
elect, be could not allow the first opportunity of
eontending against the contingence of so base a re-
source to pass, without availing hisiseif of it.
Mr. GRENFELLobsertted, ha could not but feel
considerable pain in looking into the plans of the
Right lgonoarable Gentleman ; and he had told him,
eometitne ego, having had an opportunity elsewhere
of impressing his sentiments, that . the terms of his
arrangement wen most ettravagant. He was, in
fact. giving roar and a half per cent. for his lout of
three millions, which was to be raised at 66 ; and he
was funding achequer Rill. at 79, making a dif.
Terence of 131. on this sum, or somewhere about 20
per teat. Thus a loss of 600,0001. would be sus-
, tamed by these transactions, and the only advantage
lathe Public was the contingent one, of indocieg the
holders of the three and a half per cent. stock to ac-
cept three per cent. for it, st the end of ten years.—
The option given to the subscribers to fund Fische.
quer Bills now, or on the Wilt of May, was also an
incalculable advantage, for if the stocks rise, the
holden would be disposed to fund their Exchequer
Bills; but if stocks fell below 75, they would be
disposed to say to the Right Hottherable Gentleman,
,6 We will have nothing to do with you or your Et.
chequer Bills."
Mr. Al A BBERLEY thought the harp n was ad-
vantageous for the Public, and dosiolventeganas to the
subscribers, except that part which gave-an option in
the funding of Exchequer Bills. He wished to know
the deficiency on tire Consolidated Fend for the
present year, because he understood the charge of
the sew debt wee to be borne by that fond.
The CHANCELLOR-of the EXC H EQU Eft e:-