said, he must advert to the fact that the Government had not redeemed the pledge given by the Chancellor of the Exchequer to make an addition to the strength of the revenue police in Ireland. This, however, ought to be done, if it were intended to augment the spirit duty, for an increase of illicit distillation might be expected to follow from that measure. True, illicit distillation had not increased to the degree anticipated from the additional duty imposed last year; but the reason for that was to be found in the high price of grain. It was notorious that when prices were high but little illicit distillation took place, but when otherwise too many farmers turned their grain into whisky. The number of gallons of spirits on which duty had been paid last year in Ireland was less than it had been in the preceding year, and as it was well known that drunkenness had, on the other hand, increased to a considerable extent; he, therefore, considered that the consumption of whisky among the people had not, in reality, decreased, but that an increased supply had been obtained by means of illicit distillation, than which there was no greater curse to the country. He wished, therefore, to know whether the Government intended to make use of those additional means to put a stop to illicit distillation which had been alluded to last year by the Chancellor of the Exchequer?

said, he thought the noble Lord was mistaken as to the fact of a decline having taken place in the consumption of whisky in Ireland, for the noble Lord spoke upon the authority of returns from January to January, whereas it appeared from the Inland Revenue returns, which were calculated from April in last year, when the alteration of the duty came into operation, to last April, that there had been an increased consumption in that period. It appeared from this return that the consumption in 1852–3 was 9,820,000 gallons, while in 1853–4 it had increased to 10,350,000 gallons. In the quarter ending on the 5th of April in last year the consumption was 302,000 gallons, while in the corresponding quarter in the present year it was 406,000 gallons.

said, the noble Lord (Lord Naas) had quoted from a return which had been presented to the House that morning. He believed that a greater amount of illicit distillation had been carried on than the Government supposed.

said, there had been a considerable increase in the convictions for smuggling whisky. Whenever a duty was imposed upon an article, and its price was thereby raised, its consumption was necessarily diminished, and the inference he drew from the decrease in the consumption of whisky was therefore the opposite to that of the noble Lord.

said, he wished to know whether the Government intended to take any steps to carry out the plan of which the Chancellor of the Exchequer had spoken for putting a stop to illicit distillation.

said, the subject was under the consideration of the Govern- ment, and information would be given to the House when they arrived at a determination with respect to it.

said, he hoped the noble Lord (Lord Naas) did not wish to urge the Government to make a change that would be destructive of the efficiency of the constabulary force in Ireland, which had been established only upon a pledge being given by the Government that it should not be employed either for revenue purposes or for the protection of the game.

said, by this clause the tax was to commence on the 8th August, and to continue until the 5th July, in any year after a treaty of peace was concluded. He should like to know why the tax was to continue until the 5th July in any year after a treaty of peace was concluded, when the tax was stated to be a war tax only, and intended to last only during the war? A treaty of peace might be concluded in an August or September, and in that case a tax would continue for nearly a whole year afterwards.

said, it had been customary in passing laws of this kind for war purposes, to state a specific period of the year after a peace had been concluded at which the tax should be discontinued. July the 5th had been fixed upon because that period of the year was particularly suitable for balancing the Excise accounts. There was also another reason. It was a fact that there was a larger expenditure in 1816, the year after the peace, for debts incurred during the war, than in any preceding year of the war; and the continuance of this tax for a short time after a treaty of peace might be desirable for the purpose of meeting a similar expenditure.

said, that if the peace were concluded in June, the Bill would not carry out the object which the hon. Gentleman intended it to effect. He would, therefore, suggest that the tax should be continued for one month after the ratification of the treaty of peace.

said, he had been misunderstood. He did not say for the payment of current expenses, but for the expenses incurred during the war—he meant commissariat and other expenses incurred during the war, but actually paid for after the war.

said, he thought the reasons neither good nor sufficient for a continuance of the tax to a time after peace should be proclaimed. It was a war tax, and ought only to be applied during the war.

said, the Committee must allow a sufficient time, after the determination of the war, in order that distillers' stocks on hand might be disposed of before the duty fell. The time allowed for that purpose ought to be at least six months, and that period would enable parties to prepare for the reduction in the duty.

said, that the duty to be granted was upon malt, and the clause stated that it should continue to be charged and paid during the war, and until and upon the 5th day of July next following the signing of a definitive treaty of peace. The right hon. Gentleman's reasons referred to spirits and not malt.

The reasons applied to malt exactly the same as to spirits. The principle was the same in both cases, as both were Excise duties. A certain period ought to be fixed, so as to enable parties who had stock to dispose of it before the reduction in duty.

said, the objection to the clause was, that at present it did not provide for a period after the war at which time the tax should be discontinued. It certainly did not provide for the circumstances which the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Goulburn) referred to.

said, that maltsters did not require any such notice as had been named.

said, the clause did not support the project announced by the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer. It was said this tax was to be a war tax, and the additional duty to be continued only during the war. So far from that being so, the clause made the tax payable for a period of one year, or more than a year, after a treaty of peace should be signed. It would, therefore, be no longer a war tax. He hoped the Government, though all powerful as they were, would at least listen to the dictates of reason—he had almost said attend to the rules of grammar—and make an alteration in the clause.

said, the 5th of July was a very convenient day for the discontinuance of the tax, as it was the termination of the malt season. There was some force in the reasons which had been urged for its ending at some given period after peace had been signed, and he should, therefore, suggest that words should hereafter be inserted in the clause to continue the tax until the quarter day next ensuing after six months had elapsed since the ratification of peace. He thought it ought to continue for six months after the conclusion of peace, as the expenses at the termination of a war—such as paying off the ships—were very great.

said, he considered that it would be better to leave the time to be fixed to the Government; but he hoped the right hon. Baronet (Sir C. Wood) would reconsider the subject, and see whether it would be necessary to fix upon the quarter day after a period of six mouths should have elapsed. He (Mr. Labouchere) did not see any virtue in a quarter day being fixed upon. He thought the period of six months perfectly sufficient to meet the circumstances of the case. There were reasons in favour of July being fixed upon, as it was not in the malting season.

said, be believed it had been found by experience that the 5th of July was the most convenient day to fix for terminating this duty. Hon. Members must recollect that the Government would get little or nothing from this tax during the next six months, as the malting season was over, and would not commence again until September or October. Stocks, too, were very low at this time, in consequence of the high price of barley.

said, he wished to hear some explanation from the Government as to the statement of the hon. Gentleman who had last addressed the Committee; because when he had proposed to postpone the consideration of the Resolution on the malt duty for a week, he had been informed by the noble Lord (Lord J. Russell) that it would make a difference of 250,000l. to the revenue if that were done. He trusted that the information which the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Bass) had just given the Government had not disappointed their expectations with regard to the tax. He thought the point under consideration demanded a little more inquiry than seemed to have been given to it, and, as different Members of the Government had taken different views as to the effect of the clause, he would suggest that it had better be postponed for the present.

said, he also thought it better that the discussion should be postponed, and he would take that opportunity of suggesting that if the hours required for the steeping of barley (at present forty-eight) as a test of its fitness for malting purposes were extended, the result would be an immense relief to the agriculturists generally, and a cheapening of the article, inasmuch as at present only a very small quantity of the land of the country was adapted for growing first-class barley, compared with that which would be employed in its cultivation if the suggestion he made were adopted. At present, the effect was to give protection to Norfolk and one or two other counties, to the prejudice of other parts of the country.

said, that the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Disraeli) laboured under a misapprehension as to what the noble Lord the Member for London had stated the other evening. The expectation referred to by the noble Lord that 250,000l. might be lost unless the Resolution were agreed to at once was not on account of the malting season being ended, but arose from the great probability—the almost certainty, indeed—that, if any number of days had been allowed to elapse, the stocks of malt in the hands of the maltsters would at once have been transferred to their private customers. He did not think that the estimate of 250,000l. was at all an exaggerated one under the circumstances.

said, that what he had stated was that, though the duty might be collected upon the Resolution of the Committee, still that it would be irregular to act upon that Resolution until the House had confirmed it, because what passed in Committee was not supposed to be, and was not, indeed, in point of form, a regular proceeding in the House.

said, he would appeal to his hon. Friend the Secretary for the Treasury whether he would not, before the Bill passed, consider the question of giving a drawback upon hops which were employed in the manufacture of beer for exportation, and which amounted to a considerable sum in the course of a year. They had never hitherto been allowed a drawback upon hops, but it was necessary that they should have it if the British growers were to have justice in foreign countries.

said, he thought that if a drawback were allowed upon malt, it should also be allowed upon hops, for he could not see what claim the one bad that was not equally possessed by the other.

said, he did not deny the justice of the claim, but, though it did not form any part of the present measure, still it had escaped neither his nor the Chancellor of the Exchequer's attention.

thought the Government ought to have imposed the beer tax, which, in consideration of the morals of the country, ought never to have been abandoned. The licensing system had grown up of late years. This frightful monopoly ought to be dealt with; but he feared the Government would not grapple with it. The malt tax was a singular illustration of the free-trade theory—it ought to be put a stop to as soon as possible after the cessation of the war. He could by no means agree in the suggestion of the right hon. Baronet (Sir C. Wood), that it ought to last for nine months after the cessation of the war.

said, that, before asking the Committee to agree to the Resolutions that were on the paper, he wished to say a few words by way of explanation on the second Resolution, by which it was proposed that 17s. 4d. (with 15 per cent thereon) on foreign refined sugar should be charged until six weeks after the 5th of July, and that the reduced duty of 16s. per cwt. was not to be charged till after that time. The following were the grounds on which the Government made this alteration:—The Committee was aware that on the 5th of July the whole of the raw sugar taken into consumption by the refiners would suffer great diminution of duty; the duty at present was, in round numbers, 15s.; it would, on that day, be reduced to 12s. The British refiner could not possibly avail himself of this reduction on the raw material until the 5th of July, and, as the process of refining occupied a period of six weeks or two months, he would be placed in an unfair position as regarded the foreign refiner, unless this Resolution were agreed to. It was objected, on the other hand, that the foreign refiners had, in anticipation of this disability of the British refiner, ordered large quantities of sugar from abroad to arrive in this country on or about the 5th of July, in order to avail themselves of the reduction that was to have taken place, and that now they would by the proposed alteration not have that command of the market which they expected. It had, however, been thought but just that the British refiner should only be brought into fair competition with the foreign refiner, and this was sought to be effected by the second Resolution. The Committee by agreeing to the Resolution would not foreclose further consideration of the matter, and the Government would be open to listen to the representations of all parties, in order that the various interests involved in this question might be fairly adjusted.

said, he would suggest that other objections than the one mentioned would arise from the proposed alterations in the sugar duties. He wished particularly to call the attention of the Committee to the second Resolution, which was a direct deviation from the arrangements originally proposed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer; it was fraught with injustice to all parties interested in foreign sugars, and involved a breach of contract that was not justifiable on any ground. The only attempt that had been made to justify the course proposed by the second Resolution was, that the British refiner would otherwise be placed in unfair competition with the foreign refiner, but if the small quantity of foreign sugar that went to the British refiner was taken into consideration, the Resolution could not be justified on that ground.

said, be begged to express his great satisfaction at the concession which had been made by Her Majesty's Government, and which was founded on the strictest principles of justice. If there was one subject more than another of which he thought he had taken leave for the rest of his life it was the sugar duties, and he had very little hope that he would have been called upon to express his satisfaction at having recourse to a sliding scale of sugar duties. At present he would say nothing of the policy of an alteration of those duties, but, in raising additional taxes for carrying on the war, the Government could not have selected one less open to objection, irrespective, of course, of the policy of putting a tax upon sugar.

said, he wished to suggest to the Committee the difficulty that he was afraid would arise in making a fair assessment in the present instance, as they had such a variety of duties on the same article.

said, he thought the proposal of the Government based on substantial justice, and hoped they would not do anything to bring the home manufacturer into competition with the foreign manufacturer before the time when it could be done on common grounds. He had full confidence that Government would do justice to all parties, and therefore would not oppose the Resolution.

said, he thought that it would be better to give a drawback to the home refiner during the period to which the Resolution referred, than to adopt the course proposed.

said, he wished to make one or two observations upon the discussion which had taken place. It had been stated that the present scale of duties was an attempt to remedy an obvious inequality which existed in the duties as they were levied before, with regard to the amount of saccharine matter contained in the different qualities of sugars. No doubt, that was the case; and he at once freely and frankly admitted that if it had been in their power to have allowed refining in bond without creating difficulties which it was most desirable to avoid, that would have been a far more just measure to all the parties concerned than the proposal now before the Committee, because in that ease the duty would have been paid in exact proportion to the amount of saccharine matter yielded by the different qualities of sugars. But when they considered the extensive Excise restrictions which would have been required, they were not prepared to encounter such great difficulties, or to place so important a trade under the disadvantages which every excise trade must necessarily labour under; and, therefore, when hon. Members said they hoped that the present scale of duties had been adopted as an approximation to the benefits which would have been obtained by refining in bond, he was bound to state to the Committee that the Government had no intention of departing from their present proposal, or of adopting, under any circumstances, the system of refining in bond in lieu of it.

said, he wished it to be distinctly understood that, according to the statement of the hon. Member for Westbury (Mr. Wilson) the passing of this Resolution was not to preclude the further consideration of it by the Treasury. In the meantime, however, he thought it was desirable that the Committee should know what it was of which the trade complained. It was this. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, in making the announcement which was now followed up by these Resolutions, stated that the change which the Government proposed in the sugar duties would come into operation on the 5th of July, and that from that day the different kinds of refined sugars would be admitted at a duty of 16s. per cwt. In consequence of that declaration a number of merchants gave large orders for foreign refined sugars to be sent to them, and entered into contracts, for the fulfilment of which they were, of course, responsible. Having thus compromised themselves to a large amount they suddenly found that, for some reason or other, the Treasury had put back the day from the 5th of July to the 16th of August. What was the consequence of that? It was well known in the sugar trade that the most important part of the year for the consumption of sugars was the fruit season, the greater part of which must be included between the 5th of July and the 16th of August; and therefore all these merchants who had made contracts for foreign refined sugars, to be de- livered to them on or before the 5th of July, would have to lay those sugars up till after the 16th of August. They would not have the benefit of the summer sale, and other parties who had got their sugars ready to be brought into the market would obtain all the benefits of the consumption in the fruit season. He thought the Committee would see that the case of the merchants to whom he had referred deserved the most careful consideration, and it was for that reason that he was anxious to have it clearly understood that the passing of this Resolution was not, in the first place, to preclude its reconsideration on the part of the Treasury, and was not, in the next place, to prevent the further agitation of the question in case no remedy should be provided by the Government.

said, he hoped, after what had fallen from the hon. Secretary to the Treasury, that the Government would consider this matter, and allow foreign refined sugar to come in at the same date as foreign raw sugars. If, however, he could show that there was any injustice to the home refiner, let them adopt the suggestion of the hon. Member for South Lancashire (Mr. W. Brown), and grant them a drawback. He would not divide the Committee at the present time, on the understanding that the question was to receive the further consideration of the Government.

said, he agreed with the hon. Secretary to the Treasury that there were great difficulties in the way of refining in bond, and thought it would be better to fix definitely in the Bill what the duties should be.

said, that when Resolutions were brought forward they should either be adopted or rejected at once. He thought it would be mere trifling if the Committee were to pass the Resolution now solely with the view of reconsidering it at a future day.

expressed his intention to support the Amendment, and said that his constituents in the sugar trade had given their orders on the faith of the Chancellor of the Exchequer's statement, which they could not suppose he would afterwards depart from.

said, he did not think it was wise in the Committee to oblige the Chancellor of the Exchequer to adhere strictly and precisely to the terms which he might have used in making his financial statement. When he announced the changes which he intended to propose in the sugar duties he could not possibly have had any communication with parties engaged in the trade, and it was obvious that by representations subsequently made to him by those parties, he might be induced to alter the Resolutions which were ultimately to be proposed to the House. If, therefore, gentlemen chose to speculate upon the strength of statements made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the first instance, instead of waiting till the House, by affirming his Resolutions, had declared what the proposed changes should be, they had no right to come to Parliament and complain of having been misled and deceived.

said, he was obliged to the right hon. Gentleman for the constitutional reason he had given why the merchants had no right to complain; but fortunately the argument was not required, because the alleged grievance was a mistake, and the hon. and learned Member for Belfast (Mr. Cairns) laboured under a complete misapprehension. The Chancellor of the Exchequer never proposed that the new scale of duties upon foreign refined sugars should come into operation on the 5th of July; on the contrary, when he made his statement to the House he held in his hand the precise Resolution which was now before the Committee, and that Resolution would have been passed upon that occasion, but for the proposition of the hon. Member for Huntingdon (Mr. T. Baring) to put on an additional duty of 15s. all round, instead of at once adopting the new arrangement. He supposed that the transactions referred to by the hon. and learned Member for Belfast had been entered into upon the faith of the Act of 1848, which he admitted parties had no reason to presume would cease to be the law of the land; and, if so, it was plain that the risk and inconvenience which the sugar merchants had incurred were merely those to which every trade was exposed when that House undertook to alter the law. At the same time, he was bound to repeat the observation which he had previously made, that the passing of this Resolution would not preclude the Treasury from reconsidering the question.

said, he thought it was not unlikely that this Resolution was in the hand of the Chancellor of the Exchequer when he made his financial statement to the House, and he also would admit that the exact time at which the alteration of the duties was to take place might have been misunderstood; but it was quite impossible that the Chancellor of the Exchequer could have been understood to say that there was to be a distinction between the time when the duties were to be altered upon raw sugars, and the time when the duties were to be altered upon refined sugars. He ventured to affirm that the Chancellor of the Exchequer never said a word to that effect. The right hon. Gentleman was not generally so difficult to understand as to lead to a mistake of that kind. What the trade understood him to say was, that the proposed change would be made simultaneously upon raw and refined sugars, and it was now for the first time that they learned from the lips of the Secretary of the Treasury, and from the terms of his Resolution, that such was not to be the case. He could not help thinking that the trade had been exceedingly ill used; and when the right hon. Member for the University of Cambridge (Mr. Goulburn) told them that they were not to speculate upon the strength of a statement made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, he was astonished to hear such an observation fall from a Gentleman who had himself so long and so worthily filled the high office of Finance Minister, and who, during the whole of his career, never uttered a word which he did not carry out fairly and honestly.

said, he wanted to know what the hon. Member meant by "the trade." He understood that the hon. and learned Member for Belfast (Mr. Cairns) was anxious that the new scale of duties, instead of commencing on the 16th of August, should be brought back to the 5th of July, in order to prevent a few rash and premature speculators in foreign sugars from sustaining a loss. Now, all he had to say was that any merchant who speculated upon the strength of a statement made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in bringing forward his Budget must be a very inexperienced and a very imprudent man. It very seldom happened that the whole of a Budget was stated accurately or clearly, and no part of such a statement was more liable to be misunderstood than that wherein alterations of duty were proposed. He was surprised, therefore, that such speculations should have been entered into as those to which the hon. and learned Member for Belfast had referred; but, whatever might be his feelings towards those parties who had been guilty of so much rashness and im- prudence, he felt it his duty to oppose the proposition of the Government as it stood.

said, that there could be no doubt that English refiners of sugar ought to have every just preference that could be allowed them, but, at the same time, he did not consider it advisable, on a collateral issue like the present, to open the whole question of the sugar duties. He believed that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had only done justice to the English refiners in the course which he had considered it his duty to advise the House to follow.

said, he must deprecate any further discussion upon this subject in the then state of the House, so many Members having left on the understanding that, in consequence of the absence of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, these matters would not be seriously gone into. There was no doubt that this subject might be arranged to the satisfaction of all parties if it were temperately considered, and adjusted in the usual way that all these nice financial questions were always best disposed of—namely, the quiet consideration of them by parties principally and mutually interested in them.

said, he wished to know, after what had been said, whether the Government were still open to conviction, or whether he was to understand from the right hon. Baronet the Member for Halifax (Sir C. Wood) that they would abide by their Resolution?

said, he had merely stated that the Chancellor of the Exchequer was open to solicitation on this question.

said, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had made a statement of his intention to raise the duty upon the lower class of sugar; but he had left it to be supposed that no alterations were to take place relative to the duties on refined sugars. He considered that the statement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer was very indistinct upon the matter.

said, he considered that the proposition of the hon. and learned Member for Belfast was both fair and reasonable, and he had little doubt that his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer would be happy to hear any reasonable suggestions on the subject.

said, that as the Government were evidently disposed to allow all fair reconsideration to the question, he was happy to have an opportunity of meeting the convenience of the Committee, and would not continue his opposition to the Resolution.

rose to move the Amendment of which he had given notice; upon which

said, he would appeal to the hon. Member whether he would press his Amendment in the absence of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the then state of the House, and the pressing business which it was absolutely necessary should be gone through?

said, he would not do so if he saw any other opportunity than the present of bringing it forward; but he did not see how he could come before the House on such an Amendment except on the question of Ways and Means.

said, he really could not suggest to the hon. Member any other opportunity of bringing forward his Amendment; if, therefore, he was serious in his intention of pressing it forward, he had better go on with it now.

said, he considered his Amendment to be a means of raising a sum very little short of 2,000,000l., not by the imposition of any new tax, but by a just and equal levying of a tax upon the rich which was now imposed upon the rest of the community. He disclaimed having the remotest intention of throwing any impediment whatever in the way of the Chancellor of the Exchequer raising sufficient funds for carrying on the war with vigour, by which alone, in his opinion, it could be brought to a speedy termination. He entirely approved of the determination of the Government not to carry on the war by means of loans and the creation of debts, and not to follow the example of our forefathers in throwing the cost on their posterity. At the conclusion of the last war, the present generation had a legacy left them in the shape of a debt of upwards of 800,000,000l., and during forty years of peace little progress had been made in its reduction, for it now amounted to upwards of 780,000,000l. That was a sum he thought quite sufficient to bequeath to our posterity, who might in their day have to contend with Nicholases starting up in other countries, even more powerful than the Autocrat of Russia. Even if the exigencies of the war did not require additional taxation, this proposition ought to be adopted as an act of common justice and common honesty. It was monstrous that aristocratic landowners, and the holders of real property, should escape a tax levied upon every other description of property. All property, with the exception of real property, from the value of 20l. to 1,000,000l. was subject to a probate duty of from 3 per cent to 1½ per cent. He stated the largest amount first, because the smaller amount yielded the most revenue. Property of the value of 20l. paid 2½ per cent, and of a value above 80,000l. 1½ per cent. That was very unjust, but what was worse, 20l. invested, and not left by will, paid a duty of 50 per cent more than he had named, that was to say, 3¾ per cent. To show the hardship of the law, he would instance the case of a poor man dying, with 15l. invested in a savings bank, in which case the Government had the power to send a broker to his cottage to value every item of property, even wearing apparel, and if the whole amounted to 20l. to levy 2½ per cent in case of a will, or 3¾ per cent in case of no will, upon the surviving son or daughter, without even allowing the duty on the cost of the coffin and grave of the deceased person. Perhaps a still more forcible illustration of the injustice of the law was the case of the dukedom of Portland. The late Duke left behind him one of the largest estates in the country, and a vast amount of personal property. The present Duke, who inherited the estates, by the Act of last Session paid a succession duty upon property amounting to the value of millions, of one-third of 1 per cent, or 6s. 8d. for every 100l. The personal property left to the other sons paid 1½ per cent probate, and 1 per cent legacy duty. Most probably the late Duke, who was a very humane, kind-hearted man, left legacies to his old and trusty servants, and they would have to pay at least 2½ per cent probate, and 10 per cent legacy duty. The junior branches of the family would have to pay seven times, and the servants thirty-seven times, more duty than the eldest son, who inherited the real property. There was not a single despot in all the Continent of Europe, and there were plenty of them, who would allow so unjust and unequal a law to exist. Such a law did exist in France before the Revolution, and the best commentators attributed the Revolution to such injustice as that having been left unremedied. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners appointed in 1832, recommended that probate should be taken out on all real property, and the present Lord Chancellor brought in a Bill, called the Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill, which had been lately sent down to that House, containing clauses to make real property take out probate. Nothing was said in the Bill about paying probate, but the clauses were quietly withdrawn for fear the payment of probate duty should be agitated upon them. With respect to the exemption of corporate properties from the succession duty, he considered the Chancellor of the Exchequer had not the least idea of the extent and amount of that description of property. The trading companies in London, which were in the nature of corporations, nearly every one of them possessed real property, varying in amount from 10,000l. to 50,000l. a year. He should like to know why that description of property should be exempted? It was said because corporations never die. But it was easy to ascertain the average life of man and make them pay on that average, either for a term of years or an annual sum. There were 180 corporations in England and Wales, all possessing real property, and some to a very large amount —to say nothing of corporations in Ireland and Scotland. Then again the real property of the Universities and colleges was enormous, and the lands, mines, and rectorial tithes belonging to bishops and chapters were extremely large. He did not propose to levy a tax upon the working clergy. What he proposed was, that real property should pay an equal portion of probate and legacy duties with personal property. In conclusion he had only one other suggestion to make; that the succession tax should be made payable in six months instead of by eight instalments, spreading over a period of four years and a half. This could not be called unjust, because every person who received a legacy was obliged, under heavy penalty, to pay the duty on it within twenty-one days. Amendment proposed, to leave out from the word "That," to the end of the proposed Resolution, in order to add the words—

"before the country shall be subjected to additional taxation, Real Property shall be made to pay the same Probate Duty as is now payable on Personal Property, and that Corporate, Collegiate, and Ecclesiastical Property shall pay a Duty equivalent in amount to the Probate and Legacy Duties levied on other kinds of property," instead thereof.

said, he would not dispute with his hon. Friend the importance of the subject to which he had called the attention of the Committee. He did not, however, propose to follow him through the various arguments and facts which had been used to prove the injustice of the present law, but should very shortly ask the Committee to reject the Amendment on an entirely different ground. As he had said, he did not dispute the importance, and he did not dispute in any great degree the justice of the proposition, but he asked his hon. Friend to look at the practical effect of his Amendment. The Committee was asked to increase the income tax for the purposes of the war, and the hon. Gentleman said, "Before you do that, stop and decide all these knotty questions about probate duty or real property and succession duty on the property of cor- porations." If the hon. Gentleman could undertake to suspend the war, while the House of Commons made a just arrangement of those things, the proposal would be perfectly reasonable; but as the war could not be suspended and money must be had, and the House of Commons seemed disposed to supply money in this particular way, he imagined the hon. Member's Amendment was out of place. But in order to show that the proposal to attach probate duty to real property required some consideration, without going into any lengthened argument, he would remind his hon. Friend of what he must be well aware, that probate was a stamp duty, and that real property was subject to stamps, to which personal property was not subject. There were many modes in which real property was dealt with, where stamps were required, and modes analogous, in which personal property was dealt with, where stamps were not required; and if they made a balance between the amount of stamps used for the purpose of transferring real property and the amount of probate paid by personal property, it would, he thought, be very much against the former. He thought, for the reasons he had stated, they ought not to entertain the proposal at this particular time. With regard to the latter part of the Amendment—the extension of the succession duty to corporate property, he had the satisfaction to be able to announce that a Bill was actually in preparation for that purpose; and had it not been for the unforeseen difficulties in dealing with properties of that kind, it would now have been before the House, though he did not despair that it would be passed in the present Session. At the same time he did not pledge the Government to that. The Bill, however, was in preparation. The Government had fully carried out their promise, and he hoped, after those observations, the hon. Gentleman would not press his Motion, but allow the Committee to agree at once to the Resolution.

said, he was satisfied his hon. Friend the Member for Lambeth (Mr. W. Williams) had made out a strong case for the consideration of the Government, and he was very pleased to find, from the observations of the hon. Secretary to the Treasury, that they concurred in the injustice and inequality of the tax. He trusted the Government would before long bring forward a measure to place real property precisely on the same footing as personal property, and he said that because, having all his property in land, he wished to bear a fair proportion of taxation with his fellow-countrymen. He recommended his hon. Friend to withdraw his Amendment on the present occasion, and he was persuaded when he again brought it forward it would receive the hearty and earnest support of every Liberal Member.

said, he thought the time had been very happily chosen for bringing forward this subject. They were now at war, and having to submit to increased taxation, the opportunity should be taken to impose taxes which would equalise and render just existing burdens. Nothing would more damp the natural desire to prosecute the war with vigour than for the people to think that large sums were taken from one portion of the community, whilst another portion escaped a similar impost. The Secretary of the Treasury had to a certain extent admitted the justice of the former part of the Amendment, and candidly avowed that a Bill was in preparation with respect to the latter. He was glad to hear it, for he thought nothing was more fair than that ecclesiastical corporations should pay on their property like every one else. They were the only portion of the community, with the exception of the Quakers, who did not go forth to fight. They sat at home enjoying their property, exempt from personal risk and danger, and they were the last persons who ought to object to contribute their quota to a just and necessary war. He was glad the hon. Member had persisted in the Motion, because, much as he admired the noble Lord (Lord John Russell), and anxious as he was, when consistent with his duty, to follow him, he saw that measure after measure was thrown after the Reform Bill into chaos, and they did not know where to find them.

said, he thought that, after what had fallen from the Secretary to the Treasury, it would be better to withdraw the Amendment.

said, he looked upon the injustice of the tax to be so great as to call for an immediate remedy.

said, he re-echoed the sentiment of hon. gentlemen opposite that all classes should be equally taxed. If an account were gone into of the taxes to which real and personal property were subjected, he thought that, the land tax, stamp duties, and tithes being taken into consideration, real property would not come badly out of the comparison.

said, he would not press the Amendment to a division, feeling convinced from the conduct of the Chancellor of the Exchequer that his sense of duty would induce him to take up the question.

said, he must express his surprise that those who had assented to the war should have offered opposition to the means proposed for raising the funds by which alone that war could be carried on. He considered the objections offered to the increase of the malt tax to be altogether untenable, and dissented from the opinions which had been expressed by the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Spooner) that money should have been raised by a loan. He would refer to the enormous additions which had been made to the national debt for the purpose of carrying on the last war, and to the fact brought forward by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in his recent financial statement, that for nearly one-third of the whole amount of that debt the country had received no value. Instead of resorting to fresh loans, he would recommend them, when money could again be had at 2 per cent, to create terminable annuities, and in that way to get rid of a portion of their permanent debt every year.

said, he wished to inquire whether the Resolutions to be moved were to be understood as passed simply pro formâ, and to be subject to a debate upon the whole question?

said, there could be no doubt that any Resolution passed in Committee preliminary to the introduction of a Bill would be quite open to discussion, both in principle and in detail. This was merely a preliminary Resolution, and the principle might be discussed upon the second reading of the Bill.

said, this was no part of the Chancellor of the Exchequer's plan for raising funds for the war. It was a substantial alteration of the law, upon certainly different grounds; and as the right hon. Gentleman had agreed to receive a deputation of the merchants of London on the subject, he could see no reason why the Resolutions should be now pressed.

said, it was necesssary to take the Resolution now, because the progress of public business would be considerably delayed by its postponement. It was, as had been stated, merely preliminary to the introduction of the Bill; and the hon. Gentleman was aware that there were many other stages at which a discussion might be raised. In the meantime, he was quite sure that the Chancellor of the Exchequer would be ready to attend to any representation which might be made to him upon the subject.

said, he must complain that the duty upon a bill of exchange for an amount between 750l. and 1,000l. should be fixed at 10s., whereas under the present law it was only 8s. 6d. Nothing could be more unfair than to place the wholesale trader, who had large transactions, at a disadvantage as compared with the retail trader, whose transactions were more limited, but whose profits were larger in proportion to the business done. Proceeding higher in the scale, he found that a still greater inequality was created; for upon a bill for 1,500l. the duty was to be 15s. And upon a bill for 2,000l., 20s. Whereas in either case at present it was only 12s. 6d. On all the larger amounts, the duty became proportionally higher; and as he considered this an injustice to the large trader, he should move that the duty upon bills between 750l. and 1,000l. remain at 8s. 6d., as at present.

said, it was no doubt impossible to introduce an ad valorem duty with respect to stamps, without imposing a higher charge upon the large amounts. When his right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Control (Sir C. Wood) had reconsidered the whole subject of the stamp duties, some years since, he had gone upon this principle; and the result had been, that while great reductions had been made upon the smaller stamps, there had been corresponding additions to the larger ones. This was the very object which the Government had in view in proposing the present measure, for it was felt that the stamp duty upon bills of exchange of small amount was unduly high, and pressed so heavily as to amount in many cases to a prohibition. What they wanted was that every transaction should pay a stamp duty as nearly as possible proportioned to the amount of the transaction itself. It was true, as the hon. Gentleman had said, that the stamp upon a bill for an amount between 750l. and 1,000l. was proposed to be fixed at 10s., whereas it was now 8s. 6d,; but the duty of 8s. 6d was upon a bill of two months' date, and if the date were three months it was raised to 12s. 6d.; whereas the Government being anxious not only to introduce an ad valorem duty, but to make the system as simple as possible—proposed to do away with all distinction as to date, and to charge the duty of 10s. upon all bills of this amount with- out reference to the time they might have to run. But he wished to call the attention of the Committee to the important relief which this measure would give, in reference to bills of small amount. It was proposed that a bill of exchange for every sum not exceeding 25l. should pay a duty of 3d. only, whereas the present duty on a 25l. bill was 2s. if it were drawn for any period not exceeding two months, and 2s. 6d. if for any longer date. For a transaction under 50l. they proposed to charge a duty of 6d., instead of 2s. 6d., and 3s. 6d. as at present. If they looked at every step of the scale, they would find that the principle of an ad valorem duty was exactly carried out. It was a duty of ls. on a bill for 100l., and of ls. per 100l. afterwards. The whole intention of the measure was to charge large transactions something more than hitherto; and to relieve small transactions from the very undue amount to which they had hitherto been exposed.

said, he would beg to ask whether the hon. Gentleman was of opinion that the alteration would lead to an increase or a diminution of the revenue?

said, the object had been not to increase the revenue, but it was desirable not to lose. The most careful calculations had been made by the officers of inland revenue, and the result of these calculations was, that the whole amount of the present revenue would be obtained, with the aid of the duties to be charged on foreign bills. As far as he could judge, the effect of the whole measure, in a financial point of view, would be as nearly as possible a balance.

said, he should defend the measure as an improvement, and as being, in fact, one of the best features of the budget. The present stamp duties upon bills of small amount pressed very heavily upon the small tradesman, and particularly on the beginner in business, to whom it ought to be their object to afford every possible facility.

said, he must deny that the same pro rata profit was realised upon small transactions as upon large ones, and was not, therefore, prepared to say that a strictly ad valorem scale of duties would be a perfectly just arrangement. He admitted that some alteration ought to be made, but thought the Government would have done better if they had deferred dealing with the subject until they were in a position to make some sacrifice of re- venue. His special objection, however, was to that part of the scheme which proposed to impose a stamp duty upon foreign bills of exchange.

said, he had always complained of the disproportions between the duties upon small and those on large amounts, and was surprised that any objection should be made to an attempt to get rid of it.

said, he objected to the stamp upon foreign bills; instead of imposing fresh burdens upon foreign bills, they might endeavour to lighten those to which it was now subject.

said, he would beg to point out to the hon. Member that the stamp on foreign bills was not the question now before the Committee.

said, he apprehended that the scheme must be discussed as a whole; that anticipated revenues from the stamps on foreign bills was relied upon to supply the deficiency which the modification of the duties upon inland bills would occasion; and that that modification, therefore, would not be carried out unless the other portion of the plan received the sanction of the Committee. The two questions, therefore, could not very well be separated, and those who objected, as he did, to the imposition of stamps on foreign bills were perfectly justified in stating their objections now.

said, he was quite ready to discuss the question as to foreign bills at once, if he were really to understand that the other portion of the measure depended upon that being assented to by the Committee. He would therefore ask the hon. Gentleman the Secretary of the Treasury what was to be done in the event of a bill being drawn by a person resident abroad upon his debtor resident in this country? What was the debtor to do? Was he to send the bill to the Stamp Office for the purpose of being stamped, or was he to refuse payment? This was the difficulty which he confessed had suggested itself to him, and upon which he should be glad if the hon. Gentleman would favour the Committee with an explanation.

said, he must beg to be allowed to postpone giving an answer to the question until the question of the stamp duties upon foreign bills should be regularly before the Committee. He must admit that the several facts of the measure were closely connected with each other, but he would remind the Committee that the low rates of duty had been passed without any opposition, and that it was not until they came to the higher rates that any objection was raised.

said, he wished to understand the matter clearly, that it might not be said hereafter that the Committee had precluded itself from discussing the question of the duties upon foreign bills by allowing the duties upon inland bills to pass. Did these inland duties stand upon their own merits, or did they form part of a whole scheme? If they formed part of a whole scheme, they must discuss the foreign duties now.

said, no doubt they formed part of a whole scheme, but he must again remind the Committee that the lower rates of duty had already been accepted without any question being raised. Of course, when the foreign duties came to be considered, it would be open to any gentleman to oppose them, and if they were rejected, the Government might then determine how to deal with the other portions of the scheme.

said, he wished to know how it was proposed to collect the revenue from foreign bills of exchange.

said, the difficulty of collection had hitherto been the only reason why the duty was not imposed. Government had always been unwilling to impose upon merchants the trouble of coming to the Stamp Office to have their bills stamped. Great as the trouble was, however, it was done in France, Holland, Belgium, and in most of the continental countries of Europe. The invention of adhesive stamps gave facilities for the adoption of the system here which did not before exist; and it was now proposed to issue adhesive stamps at rates corresponding to those in the schedules for all foreign bills drawn in this country; so that the person who receives such bills would be the person on whom the duty would devolve of affixing the stamp.

said, he wished to know at what stage of the circulation of the bill it would be necessary to affix the stamp? Was it to be affixed before the bill was presented for acceptance, or before the bill was paid?

said, the original proposition was that no bill should be accepted till it was stamped, which would be carrying out the analogy with the inland bills. But it was found, if they rigidly insisted upon that rule, that they would expose merchants who were in the habit of receiving large batches of bills at once to great inconvenience, and prevent them from presenting the bills on the day they received them. It was, therefore, now proposed that the bill might be stamped at any time before it was endorsed or passed from the hand of the first person who received it.

said, he would beg to ask whether it would be possible that bankers in the colonies, who were the great drawers of bills of exchange, might compound for the stamp duties on the same principle that bankers in England and Scotland were allowed to compound for their stamps? He thought this would be a great boon to them, as it would obviate many inconveniences.

said, they had not considered the plan—it was quite a new idea. He could only say that they had every disposition to carry out compounding for stamps, as they were doing it in Ireland and in Scotland in a way which had never been done before. The only difficulty which at present occurred to him was, that they had no data from which to compute the probable amount of the bills drawn by these banks.

said, the plan of enforcing the stamps, as stated by the hon. Member for Westbury (Mr. Wilson) obviated one inconvenience, but he objected to the principle altogether. As he understood the plan, it would not be necessary to affix the stamp to the bill till the period of payment, if the person into whose hands it came retained it in his own possession until that time. [Mr. J. WILSON: "Hear!"] Then, in fact, this was only a new form of imposing a stamp receipt, which, having been lowered generally, was to be re-imposed on this particular class; and it would fall not upon the bankers, but upon the manufacturing interest of the country.

said, it had nothing whatever to do with stamp receipts; but it would have this effect, that before a foreign bill could be put into circulation it must be subject, in the same way as an inland bill, to the stamp duty.

said, that if a person in this country received a bill from abroad, drawn upon himself, and which he did not require to present to others, he was afraid, unless that person was a man of honour, they would have no hold upon him for the receipt.

"Foreign Bill of Exchange, drawn out of the United Kingdom, and payable out of the United Kingdom, but indorsed or negotiated within the United Kingdom, the same Duty as on a Foreign Bill drawn within the United Kingdom, and payable out of the United Kingdom."

said, he thought there was no necessity for including bills endorsed as well as bills negotiated within the United Kingdom.

said, that what the hon. Gentleman objected to was the whole pith of the Resolution, because endorsement was the only evidence that could be obtained of negotiation. The Resolution was intended to apply to bills of exchange drawn upon the Continent, sent here as remittances for goods, negotiated here, and then sent back to the Continent for acceptances.

said, it would apply to a bill drawn abroad and payable abroad, and sent here merely for endorsement by the firm whose agent had drawn it.

said, such cases were extremely rare.

"Promissory Note, for the payment, in any other manner than to the Bearer on demand, of any sum of money, not exceeding," &c. [Same duties as on Inland Bills of Exchange.]

said, he rose, in the absence of his hon. Friend the Member for Pontefract (Mr. Oliveira), to propose the Resolution of which that hon. Member had given notice—that upon every cheque drawn upon a banker there should be imposed a duty of one penny. He knew it was not a very popular thing to propose a new tax to that House, but, after the resolution which the House came to the other night on the subject of the newspaper stamps, it was, perhaps, desirable that some substitute for that impost should, as speedily as possible, be found. He had spoken to the Chancellor of the Exchequer upon the subject, and he deemed it a proper question to submit to the House, but, in the absence of the right hon. Gentleman, he (Mr. Phinn) would not press it at the present moment. Perhaps the Committee was not aware of the present state of the law with respect to the duty on cheques. As the Stamp Act now stood, all cheques on bankers would be subject to duty, were it not for an exemption made in favour of all cheques drawn within fifteen miles of the bank on which they are drawn. So that, if any one lived above fifteen miles from his bankers, he was liable to a penalty for every cheque that he drew without a stamp. Now, he would appeal to hon. Gentlemen in the House, if they were not in the constant habit of violating this law? ["No, no."] Hon. Gentlemen said "No, no," but he would appeal to his own experience. If they were in the country, and wanted to draw a cheque upon their banker, he asked them if they were not in the constant habit of dating their cheques from London, and thereby violating the law? He thought that an anomaly so bad as this exemption ought to be done away with; but there was another reason why a cheque payable to bearer on demand ought to be subject to a tax. Persons who were in the habit of banking were now also in the habit of crossing their cheques, and getting their tradesmen, or the persons to whom they paid debts, to write their names on the back of the cheques, and, by thus using them as receipts, evading the stamp Act. In effect they made their bankers the custodians of their receipts. He thought his proposition would be rather a tempting bait to the Government. Some nights ago the House had agreed to a Resolution to the effect that the duty on newspapers required revision, and the Government then said that in a financial point of view that duty was a trumpery one, not realising more, he believed, than about 250,000l., which was collected with great trouble and expense. Some sanguine calculators had reckoned that the duty which he proposed to impose on cheques would realise as much as 500,000l., but those who had calculated the most closely were of opinion that it would produce at least 200,000l. or 250,000l. The tax would fall on those who were in the habit of dealing with bankers, it would prevent the evasion of the Stamp Act, and it would be easily collected; and he therefore hoped the Government would take the subject into their consideration.

said, he thought the hon. and learned Gentleman laboured under considerable misapprehension with regard to existing practices. Since the Bill passed last year for affixing the penny stamp to all receipts, the practice regarding cheques drawn at more than fifteen miles from London, and with regard to receipts, had entirely altered, and there was now no evasion of the law whatever. Though he himself would greatly benefit by the measure proposed, as it would reduce the labour in banking-houses to a great extent, yet he wished to call the attention of the Committee to the fact that it would impose a very heavy burden upon trade. He did not think that the hon. and learned Member had any idea of the vast number of cheques that passed through the City daily. He knew one banking-house that paid in one day no fewer than 20,000 checks. He did not mean to say that this was an ordinary transaction; but the Committee would see what a tax they would impose upon tradesmen; and when they considered that the same tax was to be imposed upon banks in the country as in the town, he thought they would pause before they adopted it.

said, he would suggest that in some of the public departments the introduction of a stamp upon checks would operate inconveniently. In the poor law department, for instance, every sum paid by Boards of Guardians was paid by check; and the greater part of the cheques were for very small sums. The moneys so paid were raised by taxation; and he put it to the Committee whether it would be right that cheques of such small amount should be burdened with a penny stamp. It was obvious that in such cases the effect would be to increase the taxes of the people, for after all the charge would fall upon the public.

said, he hoped the idea of stamping cheques would not be entertained by the Committee. No plan ever yet devised so economised the circulation as the system of drawing cheques, and he cautioned the Committee against doing anything to restrict a practice so useful and convenient. In the money market vast amounts changed hands every day, without the intervention of a single bank note, by means of cheques; and it was quite impossible but that the introduction of the stamp would injuriously affect this custom. It would entirely stop payment by means of small cheques.

said, the hon. and learned Member for Bath (Mr. Phinn) did not propose that the Committee should now decide upon the question; he only desired to elicit discussion in order that the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the House might hear and consider whatever suggestions might be offered. It was quite true, as the hon. Member for Kendal (Mr. Glyn) had said, that on the daily payments and receipts of a banking-house by means of cheques the amount of the stamps would be very considerable. But if this was a valid objection against stamps on cheques, it was a valid objection against stamps on receipts. Now, he (Mr. Bright) could scarcely conceive a tax of any kind that would be more widely or more equally diffused than that now suggested; but if his bon. and learned Friend proposed it as au additional tax simply, he should say he was undertaking a duty which ought not to devolve upon him, and the proposition ought to be opposed. But his hon. and learned Friend was not doing that, for he coupled the proposition with the suggestion thrown out in the debate on Tuesday, that it would be an admirable substitute for the newspaper stamp. The Resolution then moved was accepted unanimously both by the House and the Government. It was the opinion of the House of Commons that the newspaper stamp was a doomed tax. The hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General was sensible that the law, in its present state, could not be executed; and there was no person connected with the Board of Inland Revenue who would not admit that the newspaper tax could not be collected fairly, according to the existing law. It was, therefore, the feeling of the House, and of the public authorities, that it must be given up. Then arose the question, what should be substituted for it? The stamp on cheques it was thought might be advantageously adopted. It was quite clear that the public would gain enormously by the abolition of the newspaper stamp; and it was also clear that there would be some inconvenience in paying a certain number of pennies by the imposition of the proposed stamp. It was, therefore, a question between the two. So far as he had considered the question, he believed it to be well worthy of consideration, with a view to the adoption of this substitute. He was in the habit of drawing cheques; and regarding his own interest, and the interest of his partners in the manufacturing concerns with which he was connected, he should be extremely glad, so far as he could now see its effect, to exchange one tax for the other. He was satisfied that, in the long run, considering the advantages connected with the abolition of the newspaper stamp, that the change now proposed would be advantageous both to the commercial world and the public. This was his present opinion, but he was quite open to consider everything that could be urged on the other side. The proposition was one which, at any rate, was well worth consideration; and he hoped the Committee would not decide against it without first going into a full examination of its merits.

said, he had no doubt that the authority of the hon. Member for Kendal (Mr. Glyn) was very high, but this was a matter of mere common sense. He had not heard one single good objection to the tax, but he could see a great many advantages. The stamped cheque would acquire a new character in the country; it would become a receipt. He did not believe that the law was so extensively broken as the hon. and learned Member for Bath (Mr. Phinn) seemed to think. That hon. and learned Member thought that the stamp would have the effect of putting an end to drawing of cheques for very small amounts. He (Mr. Scully) should be glad to see that effect brought about and the nuisance of small cheques got rid of. He considered the tax would be beneficial in every way, and that it would be advantageous not only to the public, but to hankers themselves.

said, he regarded bankers' cheques as a most valuable agent in carrying on trade; and therefore he looked upon this proposition with considerable apprehension. He feared it would have a tendency to break up the existing practice, and that we might be reduced to the plan resorted to by tradesmen in France, of taking five franc pieces round in a wheelbarrow to pay their creditors. Cheques were a labour-saving instrument in the business of commerce; and to require them to be stamped would greatly fetter if not destroy their use.

said, he totally disapproved of the proposition, not from any fear of the trouble or inconvenience it might cause to himself in his business as a banker, but because such a practice would be attended with great inconvenience to the public who kept banking accounts. The hon. and learned Member for Bath did not appear to him to have an adequate conception of the practical working of the system of payment by cheques in the City of London. Nothing else was used for the settlements of the Stock Exchange. Great inconvenience and risk would be thrown on every mercantile interest in the City, if, by any plan of this kind, people were driven to keep bank notes for their payments, instead of drawing cheques. Under these circumstances, he hoped the proposition would not he entertained.

said, if there were one thing which, more than another, promoted the convenience of commerce in this country, it was the habit of keeping bankers' accounts; the habit of using the bank, not only for the custody of money, but as a safeguard against fraud. He did not believe, with the hon. Member for South Lancashire (Mr. W. Brown), that we were likely to adopt the system he had described in France, of keeping our own money and taking it round to our creditors in wheelbarrows, but he was certain that if a penny stamp had existed upon bankers' cheques in former times, the country would never have had its present amount of commercial convenience. The question was not one of payment or revenue; but whether upon the aggregate transactions of the country the evil inflicted by the proposal would not be greater than the benefit derived from it.

said, that the arguments urged against the proposition might, to a considerable extent, be applied to bills of exchange. The tax would not be a very heavy one. He perceived that all the bankers in the House who had hitherto spoken were against the plan; but he begged to say that he had had a conversation with a large London banker, who was decidedly in favour of the measure. It would certainly he an excellent substitute for the newspaper stamp. It must be admitted that great ameliorations had been made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in respect to the scale of duties upon bills. of exchange; and he believed that the trade of the country would be disposed to accept the penny stamp on cheques in consideration of that relief.

said, this was one of those cases on which a great deal might be said on both sides. It was merely a suggestion from an independent Member to the Government, it not being the province of private Members to propose taxes; but it appeared to him that, although a great deal had been said in its favour, much more might be said still. He was rather alarmed, he confessed, when he beard Gentlemen connected with banking and mercantile interests declare that certain and inevitable destruction would follow if the House laid a penny stamp upon cheques—that the consequence, according to his hon. Friend the Member for South Lancashire (Mr. W. Brown) would be that we should go to the system of France, where, in consequence of the great depreciation of paper money, tradesmen carried five-franc pieces round in wheelbarrows to pay their creditors. He had seen so many direful prognostications of this sort not verified, that he regarded all such arguments with perfect composure. Some hon. Gentlemen had talked of the difficulty of working this system. Now he considered that there was no difficulty at all in it. The system was already in operation. Bankers already issued two kinds of cheques—one for the country, which were stamped, and the other for the town, which were not stamped. All that was now suggested was, that both should be Stamped. They might have their names embossed upon them, which would be an additional guarantee against forgery. Something had been said about the weight of the tax upon small sums. What would be its amount upon a cheque drawn by stockbroker to the parties who paid it? What was the ordinary amount of such cheques? He was not much acquainted with Stock Exchange business, but he imagined that stockbrokers did not generally draw cheques for less than 20l. [Mr. MASTERMAN: For less every day.] Then the transactions in Consols were smaller than he had thought them to be. He supposed, however, that not many cheques were drawn in respect to Stock Exchange business for less than 10l. [Mr. MASTERMAN: Yes, much lower.] Then the transactions were still smaller than he supposed; but take these cheques at 10l. each. One penny was the 1–2400th part of 10l. It was absurd to say that such a tax was a heavy burden. The right hon. Baronet (Sir J. Trollope) had made a difficulty with regard to the case of the payment of small cheques in the ordinary working. of the poor law. Such cases might be met by exceptions. The penny receipt stamp did not extend to sums below forty shillings, and some analogy of that sort. might be established. On the whole, looking at this stamp as a substitute for an injurious tax, that it would be no obstruction to business, while it promoted the diffusion of knowledge and advanced the revenue, it was clear that a great deal might be said in its favour. Let them inquire into the subject. Let them go down into Lombard-street, and ascertain the number and amount of the cheques presented there in any given day. He would undertake to do so himself as far as he could. By this means much practical information would be obtained; and he thought it would most probably be found that, like the case of the penny receipt stamp, when once put into application it would work with greater satisfaction than any other tax that could be proposed, and certainly with less injury to the community.

said this was not a novel proposition. He could answer for it that it had been propounded to every Gentleman who had filled the office of Chan- cellor of the Exchequer for many antecedent years, and that it had, after due consideration of its consequences, and of the pressure it would create upon particular parties in the country, been by them condemned. This fact, he admitted, was no argument why, in an advanced state of knowledge, it should not now be adopted. But when the hon. Member for the West Riding argued the question as if it had only reference to the largest transactions upon the Stock Exchange, and to large concerns such as those with which the hon. Member for Manchester (Mr. Bright) was connected, he was mistaken. There were other persons in the country, also in business, upon whom the tax would operate with considerable severity, not in respect to its amount, but from the impediments which the stamping of cheques would produce. This class of persons were the minor tradesmen of the country—those classes who were in the habit of paying their money away by small cheques upon a neighbouring banker. On these classes a penny stamp would operate most injuriously. As to the stamp on bills of exchange, he did not consider the case analogous to the present proposal.

said, he had listened with great attention to all the arguments just urged for and against this proposal; and it was now his duty to inform the Committee that his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer had given the greatest possible consideration to the subject during the last six months. The decision at which his right hon. Friend had arrived, he had arrived at from reasons and considerations altogether different from any stated in the course of the present debate, and his conclusion was, that it would be highly impolitic and injurious to impose the proposed tax. He was not going to place much stress upon the argument of the danger and injury it might produce in the case of large traders. There was no doubt at all, as the hon. Member for Kendall (Mr. Glynn) had stated, that it would entirely alter the greater number of transactions in the City of London, and especially those connected with the Stock Exchange, in respect to which a large amount of payments were made every day. He repeated that it would alter the ordinary course of transactions, and that, though with some inconvenience, the tax might be evaded. But the real considerations which had weighed with the Government in arriving at their conclusion that it would be im- politic to propose this tax, were those which he would now state, and he believed they would deserve the serious attention of the Committee. The Committee would have observed that during the last twenty years there had been no greater development in any branch of commerce than in the banking interests of the country. If hon. Members would consider the state of the country with regard to banking accommodation in small towns before the establishment of the joint-stock bank system, they would remember that there was then a state of things extremely inconvenient, compared with the present system, and a system the reverse of comfortable to all concerned. Joint-stock banks were established in Scotland many years before they were introduced into England. In every village branches were established, and the mystery always was—the secret which English bankers could never understand—how it was that the Scotch banks could afford to open branches in such small villages and towns in a comparatively poor country. In one small village, with not 1,000 inhabitants, there were three branch banks. How were they maintained? Why, upon a close investigation before a Committee of that House, it became evident, at last, that the secret was really the economy of capital which was accomplished in consequence of these banks holding out to the small capitalists of the locality the temptation of interest from day to day upon their customers. It came out that, in consequence of this system, the deposits in the Scotch banks—he was speaking of fifteen years ago—were upwards of 33,000,000l. sterling, all bearing interest, while the currency of the country in notes, which was economised by the use of cheques and the keeping of banking accounts was, in fact, barely 3,000,000l. The Government had watched with the greatest interest the development of the same principles in England. They have seen joint-stock banks established in the large towns of England, with branches in small towns; they had seen small tradesmen who, twenty years ago, never thought of keeping a banking account, invariably send all their spare money to the bank, and pay their bills by cheques. The result had been most satisfactory. Instead of keeping considerable sums of money in their possession, these tradesmen sent it to the bank, and the effect had been to increase the aggregate amount of capital at the disposal of the bank for ordinary commercial pur- poses. Now, if a stamp were imposed upon cheques drawn upon bankers, the inevitable consequence would be that small shopkeepers, farmers, and large traders, instead of drawing a single cheque for each transaction as they did now, would draw one for a sufficient amount to carry them through the week. The consequence would be a return to the state of things as it existed some years ago, when large amounts of capital lay idle in individual hands, the aggregate of which, if placed in bankers' hands, would have been of the greatest use to the community. Taking, then, the widest view of the case, and after the fullest consideration, the Government could not give their assent to the proposition. It was said, however, that it would yield a very large amount of revenue. From inquiries which the Government had made, they could not at the utmost expect it to produce more than 100,000l. a year. Under all the circumstances, if his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer were present, he would state, he knew, in strong terms, his objection to the imposition of such a tax. He (Mr. Wilson) entertained the same opinion upon similar grounds. He believed it would be the means of wasting capital by its dispersion in small portions.

said, that after the explanation of the hon. Gentleman he would withdraw the Resolution; but he could not do so without stating that he considered the estimated produce of the proposed stamp—100,000l.—as very much below the real amount. This stamp was an instrument by which the great and wealthy might contribute a large annual sum to the revenue without perceiving it, and he considered that it might also be accomplished without the slightest injury to trade. The question had made great advances in public estimation, and he believed it would continue to make way until its adoption.

said, if this tax was imposed, and he believed it would be imposed by some Chancellor of the Exchequer before very long, though it might be opposed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer now, he was of opinion that it would be attended with most advantageous results to the public. He believed that, though it was now opposed by Gentlemen connected with many London banking houses, whose views were supported by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, it would be an advantageous mode of collecting public revenue, and that it would not be found to interpose any impediment to the general spread and increase of banking in this country.

in moving the second reading of this Bill, said, the object of it was to rescue a helpless portion of the community from a state of misery and degradation to which they were still subjected notwithstanding the passing a a former measure on the same subject. The Act to which he alluded had been practically evaded in this way. It prohibited the sending up flues children of a certain age, but in order to prevent evidence being given on this point, the master was frequently in the habit of locking the door, so as to render conviction impossible. In London the Act had been almost entirely effective, and the system of cleansing chimneys by machinery was nearly universally adopted, and in Huddersfield and Whitby a climbing boy was almost unknown. Nothing but the gross ignorance and idleness of the master sweeps, and their want of inclination or ability to provide machines, had prevented the Act from being equally effective throughout the kingdom. To show that the evil was no imaginary one, he would refer to a few cases which had been given in evidence. One witness was asked how many deaths had occurred in Manchester in consequence of the continuance of the practice of which he complained within two years. The reply was, several. One boy, who was put into a flue when it was hot, was almost dead when he was got out, and died very soon afterwards. Another boy, ten years of age, was so badly burned that he was rendered a cripple for life. Another boy came tumbling down and died from the effects of the burning. In another case, a boy who was driven up a flue by his master did not come out again alive. There were two cases in which children had been literally roasted to death. The boys in these cases were not more than five or six years old. In June, 1851, a boy named George Wilson, ten years of age, who bad swept nine chimneys, was suffocated in the tenth, up which he had been forced by his master; and a witness said that the place was so hot that he could not have kept his hand on it for five minutes. But, besides this ground of complaint, there was another circumstance which ought not to be overlooked. These children were regularly sold. It was proved that one boy, who was terribly burnt, had been sold for a guinea, and another child, eight years of age, who had been sold five times over, was taken before a magistrate at Hull, who exclaimed very justly, "They may talk of slavery, but there is no slavery worse than this." Now, there was no difficulty in preventing these evils, and he believed the Bill now before the House would provide an effectual remedy. By the former Act, in order to insure a conviction, it was necessary to show that a boy had been seen going into a flue or coming out of it, but such evidence could not be obtained in consequence of the master locking the boy up in the room. Now, the first clause in the Bill provided that every master sweep who allowed any person under sixteen years of age to engage or assist in this trade should be liable to be punished; and the second clause provided that the onus of proving the age should rest on the person accused. Besides the deaths which had been occasioned by forcing children up flues, according to the evidence of Mr. Guthrie and other eminent men, persons thus employed were subjected to a cancerous disease which made their lives loathsome. He, therefore, called upon the House to prevent these helpless children from becoming the helots and pariahs of society. It was the duty of the Legislature to reduce the amount of suffering to the smallest possible extent, and he trusted it would no longer suffer these unfortunate children to be exposed to degradation.

in seconding the Motion, said, that the trade in these children was nothing but a petty species of slave trade, and that he would support the Motion for the second reading on the ground of humanity, and for the sake of rescuing those children from a state which demoralised them.

said, if he believed that the proposition of his hon. and learned Friend would effect the object he had in view he should not have objected to it, but in his opinion it would utterly fail to do so. If the House looked to the provisions of the 3 & 4 Vict. cap. 85, he thought it would be convinced that further legislation in the path laid down in that Act would not meet the evil complained of. By the 2nd and 3rd section of that Act it was provided that no person could be employed, or allowed to ascend or descend a chimney, or enter a flue, under a penalty of not more than 10l., nor less than 5l., and that it should not be lawful to apprentice any person to the trade under the age of sixteen years, His hon. and learned Friend proposed that any person assisting in the trade should be liable to a penalty, and the consequence would be, if the Bill became law, that a man walking in the street with a boy fifteen years old, carrying a soot-bag, would be liable to a penalty of 10l. Then, again, his hon. and learned Friend was about to introduce an anomaly into the law, by calling upon the person accused to prove a negative. That was a new feature in the law, and he did not believe the House would sanction such a principle. On these objections he took his stand, and trusted the House would not sanction the second reading of the Bill, unless his hon. and learned Friend could show that his propositions would meet the evil of which he complained. The straightforward way to meet the evil would be to enact that every chimney should be of a peculiar construction. He believed that the measure now before the House would, if carried into effect, introduce an odious system of informations, and lay the foundation for an immense amount of litigation, without remedying the evil complained of, he should, therefore, move as an Amendment that the Bill be read a second time that day six months.

seconded the Amendment. He considered that the hon. and learned Member who had moved the second reading of the Bill had shown no grounds for legislation, much less for legislation of such an exceptional and objectionable character as the present Bill. He contended that the present law on this subject went much further than did the proposed Bill in providing a remedy for the evils complained of, while the second clause of this Bill violated a great principle of the English law by throwing the onus probandi on the party charged with the offence.

said, the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State for the Home Department had not denied the existence of evils of the most serious character, which this Bill was designed to remove. He regretted extremely the course taken by the Government, and should give his vote most cordially for the second reading.

said, he thought that the Bill had failed to find the real remedy for the cases of fearful cruelty which had been cited. The hon. and learned Member (Mr. Phillimore) had stated that the difficulty of proving these cases resulted from the master sweep closing the doors of the rooms in which the boys were engaged. Why could they not, then, as in the Gaming-houses Bill, enact that the doors should be left open? He should support the second reading of the Bill, but he trusted that in Committee a more practical remedy than the Bill at present contained would be provided.

said, he thought no good reason had been shown for bringing in a Bill which would be extremely detrimental in its effect, and he believed would not meet the evil. By the law as it stood, no young person under the age of twenty-one, was allowed to climb any chimney. There was the same penalty applied to the offence now as that in the Bill before them, and the only reasons for extending the provisions of the present law must be that they were going to give a better remedy. But it was expressly laid down by the third clause that the same remedies were to be pursued which were now available. The effect of another clause would be to prevent any person from assisting a chimney sweeper in any way, and it would be illegal for the man even to employ Ids son of fifteen years of age in driving his donkey. If, however, it were intended only to prevent cases of aggravated cruelty, in which boys were sent up crooked and unsafe flues, and brought down in a state of corporeal suffering, he maintained that the law was already sufficient for that purpose. He opposed the Bill because it would interfere with legitimate trade, so as to prevent even a lad of fifteen from being employed in a way that would not be detrimental to his health in any respects.

said, the Upper House had had a Committee, and had taken evidence upon this subject, which evidence the House of Commons had not got. The House, therefore, was going to decide upon a case the evidence upon which they had not heard or read a single word of, except that portion which had been given by the hon. and learned Member (Mr. Phillimore). Would the House, under these circumstances, take the re- sponsibility of saying that the subject should not receive further consideration, and reject a Bill which had been carefully drawn up in the other House, and which, however unsatisfactory the wording of a particular clause might be, ought, he thought, to be read a second time.

said, the objection taken to the Bill was, not that a case of great cruelty had not been made out, but that, with the best possible intentions, this Bill utterly failed to provide a remedy for the evil which existed. It purported to facilitate the process of proof, and so to enable you to convict for offences committed under the former Statute; but, instead of doing this, the Bill created an entirely new class of offences, and turned those things into offences which the House certainly never wished to regard as such.

said, he would have been quite content not to say a word upon this subject, if those hon. Gentlemen who disapproved the Bill would vote against it. There seemed, however, to be a disposition on the part of the House which he did not think was very favourable to good legislation. Because, it was argued, there were evils in the law with respect to chimney sweepers, therefore this Bill must be read a second time, whatever its provisions might be. He did not think this was a reasonable mode of proceeding. The hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. Phillimore) had stated several very dreadful cases in which the law had been violated, and young children had been made to do that which had not only affected their health, but very often was fatal to their lives. Well, then, if there was to be a Bill upon this subject, let the House see, in the first place, that it would punish those who were guilty of these offences, and, in the next place, that it did not punish those who were innocent. With regard to the punishment of the guilty, he did not see that there was any mode described by this Bill by which the practices it was sought to repress might not still be carried on. He did not think that a boy merely walking by the side of a chimney sweeper would be sufficient proof of any offence; but suppose the chimney sweeper took the lad with him into a house for the purpose of getting him to ascend a chimney—as soon as they entered there was an end to the proof that the boy was improperly employed unless the doors were opened, and no conviction could be obtained. But, then, if another chimney sweeper did not employ a boy in climbing chimneys, but in riding his donkey or in carrying a sack, that man might be convicted of an offence. No mode, therefore, of convicting the guilty was supplied; but there was a mode by which the innocent might be convicted. He could not think that such a Bill was one which ought to be read a second time. But then it was said that, although the Bill did not contain a single provision which the House was likely to adopt, some provisions might be suggested, and clauses introduced in Committee. Now, he had not heard during this discussion any such clauses suggested. The hon. Member for Dumfries (Mr. Ewart) had, indeed, suggested that when the chimney sweepers entered a house the doors of that house might be ordered to be left open. But were they to have a general provision of this kind? Was every householder, at four or five o'clock in the morning, when his chimneys were being swept, to be made to leave the street door open for burglars or pickpockets to walk in? He could not think that the passing of this Bill would be at all efficacious in preventing the evil; and he was afraid, with this law, as with respect to many others, we should not have the means of putting it in operation until we had a public prosecutor. Until we had persons charged with seeing that the laws were enforced, he did not think that a Bill of this kind would have any effect.

said, he should oppose the Bill, as likely to prove quite ineffective. He thought the law, as it stood, was sufficiently ample, and that it was not worth while wasting the time of the House in considering this measure.

said, he did not doubt the importance of this subject, but he was opposed to the second reading on the ground that there were measures before the House in which the public took a deeper interest, and which this Bill had the effect of deferring.

said, he did not think the time of the House was misspent in considering a question of this description, when it was admitted on all sides of the House that the evils which the Bill sought to remedy really existed. According to the present state of the law, the age of sixteen was the earliest at which a boy could be apprenticed to the business of a chimney sweeper; but that enactment was evaded by chimney sweepers employing boys under sixteen, but who were not ap- prentices, in going up flues and chimneys, by which the evil the Bill had in view was produced, and not now denied. He thought it rather too much to say that the Bill should not be read a second time, and that the House was not to consider in Committee the best way of meeting the evil complained of.

in reply, said he had never heard more frivolous arguments than had been urged against this Bill. He admitted the existing law was efficient, provided it could be thoroughly carried into effect; but experience had shown that that was next to impossible; and if some such Bill as the present was not passed into a law, the only hope of its promoters, as the noble Lord (Lord J. Russell) had said, was blank despair, and those miserable children would continue to be the victims of a heartless tyranny.

I did not say any such thing.

said, the present Bill was a singular measure. It empowered the Chief Commissioner of the Board of Works to repair and maintain the public statues in different parts of London, and those statues were enumerated in a schedule annexed to the Bill. He found, however, that several of the public statues were omitted, which was very singular, inasmuch as those which had been omitted were statues of persons who had been Members of that House, and all of them distinguished ones. The statue of Lord George Bentinck, for example, had been omitted. But, what was more remarkable, those of two distinguished men, the Leaders in their time of the two great parties in that House, had also been excluded from the Bill—he meant the statue of Mr. Fox, in Russell-square, and that of Mr. Pitt, in Hanover-square. He wanted to know why those statues had been omitted?

said that the reason was, that these statues were private property. That of Lord George Bentinck, was the property of the Duke of Portland; that of Mr. Fox, of the Duke of Bedford; and that of Mr. Pitt, of the Earl of Harewood.

said, he wished to know whether it was true that this Bill had been suggested by the abstraction of one of the early kings of the House of Hanover?

said he believed it was the fact, that the Bill had been introduced on account of the disappearance of the statue of George I. from Leicester-square, and of the abstraction of the sword of the statue of Charles I. at Charing-cross.