The Committee will remember that in the Budget resolutions as now embodied in the Finance Bill it was proposed to impose a duty of 2s. per cwt. on molasses and all sugar and extracts from sugar that cannot be tested by the polariscope, and 1s. 8d. per cwt. on glucose. Well, since those resolutions were passed we have been able, of course, to investigate the nature and quality of the articles comprised under those two heads much more exhaustively than was possible before the resolutions were proposed; and I am quite satisfied that the duties imposed by these resolutions on molasses and glucose were not sufficient to guard the sugar revenue, and were not fair to manufacturers here with reference to certain kinds of molasses and glucose, while, on the other hand, they were too high with regard to unexhausted molasses. Among the extracts of sugar which are classed together with molasses in the Bill as it now stands are invert sugar and other kinds of extracts which contain as much as 80 per cent., I think, of sweetening matter, and which are not at all by-products of raw sugar, as are molasses, but are obtained from raw sugar of a high quality, polarising at from 90 deg. to 93 deg., which would itself pay a duty of 3s. 1d. to 3s. 2d. Therefore it is clear, I think, that to impose a duty of not more than 2s. a cwt. upon articles of that class would result in a very considerable loss to the Revenue, and would also place the foreign producer of such articles in a position of preference to the extent of something like 9d. per cwt., as compared with the manufacturer of such articles here. On the other hand, there is a kind of molasses of very poor quality, largely exhausted in the process of manufacture, which contains a comparatively small amount of sweetening matter, and is used to the extent of 20,000 or 30,000 tons a year for cattle feeding, and also to some extent in the manufacture of blacking, dyes, and other articles. Two shillings per cwt. was too high a rate for any article of that sort. The matter has been brought under my notice from both Scotland and Liverpool, which are interested in these imports. Therefore, in place of the duty on molasses as now proposed in the Finance Bill, I propose that molasses and all sugar and extracts from sugar which cannot be tested by the polariscope, if containing 70 per cent. or more of sweetening matter, shall pay 2s. 9d. per cwt.; if containing less than 70 per cent. and more than 50 per cent. of sweetening matter, 2s. per cwt., as at present in the Bill. That relates, I think, to certain syrups which are largely consumed by the poorer classes. If containing not more than 50 per cent. of sweetening matter, 1s. per cwt. only. With regard to glucose, also, it is necessary to make an alterations The duty of 1s. 8d. on glucose was based on the assumption that glucose contained about 40 per cent. of sweetening matter. We have ascertained that there are two kinds of glucose, one of which, the solid glucose, contains a very much larger amount of sweetening matter than that. It is largely used for brewing purposes, and it is equal in sweetening power to something like 80 per cent. of sugar; and, therefore, solid glucose ought to pay a corresponding duty of about. 2s. 9d. Liquid glucose has a higher sweetening power than I supposed, varying from 45 to 55 per cent., and therefore I think the duty on that should be 2s. instead of 1s. 8d., as proposed in the Bill. I may say that we have had practical proof that the glucose duty as it now stands in the Finance Bill is insufficient to guard the sugar revenue, because, since the duty was enacted, it is a very remarkable fact that the import of glucose from abroad has been of a much higher sweetening power than that which was formerly sent into this country, so that it is perfectly obvious that it is competing unfairly in the market with sugar. I propose that these duties should commence from to-morrow, and that a similar Excise duty should be levied on molasses and glucose, to take effect also from to-morrow. When the duties on molasses and glucose were originally proposed, it was impossible to propose that the Excise duty should come into force on the same day as the Customs duty, because, as the Committee are aware, in order to levy an Excise duty it is necessary to make arrangements for the manner in which it shall be levied. This can only be done after careful communication with the manufacturers of the article on which the duty is to be levied. That could not take place before the introduction of the Budget; but the matter has now been entirely arranged, and the Inland Revenue authorities inform me that they are prepared to levy the Excise duty on glucose and molasses as from to-morrow, so that both the manufacturers here and abroad will be from that day placed on precisely the same footing. I trust the Committee will be willing to make these alterations in the resolutions, which are, of course, only preliminary to my proposing Amendments to the Finance Bill In order to carry them into effect.

said he thought the House ought to give a little attention to the action which was now being taken by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. To his mind the proposals of the Finance Bill had not received the consideration which they ought to have done. They were witnessing that afternoon what he might call the first scene in the new drama of Protection which had been set up in this country. They had a graduated scheme under which these new duties were established. It was a subtle scheme of Protection. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had told them that there was no opportunity before the Budget was introduced of inquiry as to the imposition of the Excise duty now proposed but he maintained that they were driven into the difficulties which had necessitated these alterations, because they had accepted the principle of a graduated duty. He believed that it was not until after the introduction of the Budget that the idea of an Excise duty cropped up. He saw no reason, if they were to have one, why it should not have been enforced ever since the 19th April.

I have explained that it was impossible to arrange the details before.

said he desired to call attention to the inconvenience which had been inflicted on a very important trade for two or three months, and which he believed would fall upon the general public in consequence of the complicated system which it had taken the Treasury so long to incubate. He would like to make an appeal to the leaders of the party to which he belonged to be warned by what was going on that afternoon, and to take a little more interest in the matter. He regretted exceedingly that there was no one on the Front Opposition Bench to say one word of protest against the system which the Chancellor of the Exchequer embodied in the Budget and which he had enlarged that evening. The right hon. Gentlemen the Members for East Wolverhampton, West Monmouth, East Fife, and Montrose Burghs had all given the sugar duty away. The one crumb of comfort he had got was that the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition had not committed himself yet. That was the right hon. Gentleman's great virtue. He waited, with regard to these complicated matters, until he saw the whole plan of the Chancellor of the Exchequer unfolded. They had been told by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Wolverhampton that Mr. Gladstone and Sir George Cornewall Lewis had both imposed a sugar duty. But the circumstances were not altogether analogous. It was a terrible thing for this country, after twenty-five years of freedom from a duty of this nature, to have it reimposed, especially under the complicated conditions now suggested, conditions which, in view of the enormous consumption of the article taxed, must cause great inconvenience. Mr. Gladstone and Sir George Cornewall Lewis had not had to act after a period of twenty-five years freedom from the duty; they only varied it, in fact, and he therefore appealed to the Leader of the Opposition, who, as he had pointed out, had not yet committed himself, to closely watch the proceedings of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. There were great issues involved which must inevitably lead to considerable discussion.

said that, as he understood the Chancellor of the Exchequer's proposal, the effect was to put glucose on the same footing as sugar.

Yes.

said that, in that case, the right hon. Gentleman's resolution was a very proper one. But it appeared to him that an element was being introduced as a subject of taxation which was not proposed to be taxed by the Finance Bill. That was sweetening matter. He would like to ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what he meant by sweetening matter, and how the amount of sweetening; matter was to be ascertained. He wished it to be understood that he was not complaining of the right hon. Gentleman's proposal.

said that in the Finance Bill, as it now stood, under the head of "molasses" other articles were included in the words "and all sugar and extracts from sugar which cannot be tested by the polariscope." The polariscope could not be applied to these articles, and they were grouped together as one thing, so that a certain duty might be levied upon them. It had been discovered that they varied very much in their sweetening matter, and obviously it was necessary to make a difference between them in order to protect the sugar revenue.

said the Chancellor of the Exchequer had now proposed a radical change in the resolution which was formerly brought forward. He had announced that if the Bill were passed in the shape in which it was drafted, they would be unwittingly putting on a large protective duty with regard to glucose and certain forms of molasses. That was a very good illustration of the effect of putting a tax on an article which entered largely into the manufactures of the country. If, when the Government brought in the Bill, the two or three Members on the Opposition side of the House who had taken an interest in the question had brought Forward the theory which the Chancellor of the Exchequer now stated, they would have been laughed at. If the Chancellor of the Exchequer had not made this proposal now the result would have been that a protective measure would have been passed without perhaps more than ten Members knowing what was being done. The Chancellor of the Exchequer told them now that the resolution would prevent this being a protective measure. How were they to know that? They had simply the Chancellor of the Exchequer's statement. How many members of the Committee were in a position to say that they understood what was meant by Copeland's test, by which it was proposed to ascertain the amount of sweetening matter in sugar and molasses? They were going blindly in this matter on the word of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who admitted that he did not understand the subject. Unless the right hon. Gentleman was able to give a fuller explanation of the method by which the sweetening power of those various substances was to be tested, it was preposterous to ask the House of Commons to pass a measure which might be a protective measure. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had at this stage introduced for the first time the expression "sweetening matter." What was sweetening matter? The Committee had received no definition. It was not sugar, and if the right hon. Gentleman meant the power of certain articles to impart sweetness, then he ought to draw a distinction between beetroot sugar and cane sugar. Cane sugar had greater sweetening power than an equal quantity of beetroot sugar. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had drafted and introduced the Finance Bill in blank ignorance as to the relative sweetening powers of liquid and solid glucose. What difficulty was there in getting that information as to the difference earlier from the chemists or experts on whose advice he relied? He must have had at his command confidential men at Somerset House, who could have told him the difference between liquid and solid glucose. The hon. Member did not see the slightest ground for the position taken up now by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, seeing that he was in a position to make inquiry and to get the information before he introduced the resolution. Surely it was not beyond the ingenuity of modern chemists to liquefy solid glucose, and if that were done the whole structure of the new financial resolution would be knocked on the head. He thought it was the most extraordinary doctrine ever introduced in the House of Commons that a most complicated financial provision should be based on the assumption that the present relations between the sweetening powers of solid and liquid glucose would remain unchanged. This was only a proof of the vicious character of the tax. An extraordinary revolution was being introduced in the financial system of the country. He had watched with amazement the docility with which the House of Commons had accepted this extraordinary change. It was a tax, in his opinion, which combined in itself every possible objection to a tax. It was a tax on an essential and most valuable article of the food of the people. Already the price of blacking and biscuits had been raised. He was informed that Huntley and Palmer had raised the price of their biscuits, and even of those which contained no sugar at all. [Laughter.] Hon. Members laughed, but that was a fact. Peek, Frean, and Company had sent out a circular stating that they had been compelled to raise the price of all their biscuits without reference to the question whether they contained sugar or not. The tax would be very costly to levy, and it would be impossible, at least for several years, to be quite certain whether or not it was discriminating against the manufacturers of this country and in favour of manufacturers abroad. It was a tax which sinned against all the great canons by which the financiers of the last fifty years had been guided in bringing the finance of this country to a state of perfection which had made it the envy of every expert throughout the world. On these grounds he would resist the tax at every possible stage.

said the hon. Member for East Mayo had charged the Chancellor of the Exchequer with desiring to impose a graded duty on sugar. It appeared to him that the object of the Chancellor of the Exchequer was to place glucose and sugar of different qualities upon an entirely equal footing so far as he could. It was impossible for obvious reasons that the Chancellor of the Exchequer should make exhaustive inquiries into this subject before bringing forward the proposal. If, of course, the right hon. Gentleman had made such inquiries everybody would have known what one of the principal features of the Budget was to be before the time came for explaining it. The hon. Member for East Mayo complained that he did not understand all the details of the chemical tests on this question. How many Members would be able to understand them unless they had some special chemical education? The Chancellor of the Exchequer had at his command the advice of able and experienced experts, and he had taken their opinion. It was no doubt on their advice that the changes he now proposed were made. The hon. Member for East Mayo wanted to know how many Members of the House of Commons had even the beginnings of an understanding of the question, and went on to say that he did not believe half a dozen did. He thought the hon. Member was perfectly right, and that the hon. Member himself could not be included in the number. The inference he drew from the statement was, what a blessing it would be if a few Members could recognise their want of information on certain subjects, and that they were not qualified, although ready, to talk on all possible occasions. After all, the speech of the hon. Member was an attack more than anything else on the sugar duty branch of the Budget; but whether it was right or wrong to impose a duty on sugar, at any rate that duty had already been agreed to by the House.

The objects proposed by the right hon. Gentleman are of an exceedingly technical and complicated character, and he will not expect, I am sure, the ordinary Member of Parliament to be able either to follow exactly what he said or to appreciate the rights and the wrongs of any question which might be raised in the matter. All I can say is that it will be the duty of us all to get such information as we can as to the general effect of the duty which the right hon. Gentleman proposes, which seems to me, roughly speaking, in the direction of that equal treatment of these different commodities which certainly ought to be the object which we should seek to obtain. I think that some of us should look at the question very closely, not from the general point of view of the sugar duty, which is hardly before the Committee to-day, but from the point of view of the effect of its details upon Protection, and the consequences that may follow to different branches of the trade of this country from the duties that are proposed. Now, there is one matter to which my attention has been called, and which, as represented to me, seems highly deserving of attention, namely, the duty charged upon the sugar in canned fruits. The duty has been, I believe, imposed on the sugar in canned fruits far exceeding the proportion of duty that ought to have fallen upon it, and in that way a considerable industry is injuriously affected and a protective effect is created, and it will lead, no doubt, to a considerable increase in the price to the consumer in this country. In a matter so diffused as this, the use of sugar in manufactures, where there are so many developments of industry and ingenuity in the employment of sugar in various commodities, I think we may be sure that there will be cases of this sort which will require the attention of the Committee. I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman's attention has been particularly called to the point to which I refer, nor do I know that it would require to be dealt with in Committee, but I hope he will be able to give a satisfactory explanation of the circumstance to which I have referred. For the present moment, I think we are hardly in a position to say "Aye" or "No" to the detailed changes which the right hon. Gentleman has intimated to us, but it will be our duty to press inquiry before we get out of Committee on the Finance Bill.

said that, however much the proposal of the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer might be criticised from a hostile point of view by hon. Gentlemen opposite, it would meet with great acceptance from agriculturists generally. He spoke with some knowledge on this subject. He had been somewhat startled by the fact that by the first resolution brought into the House the tax on molasses would have amounted to 2s. a cwt., or 12s. a barrel, which seemed to him a particularly heavy tax on a valuable cattle food. He, however, did not intend to enlarge on the topic, but he simply wished to thank his right hon. friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer for looking into this matter, and bringing this new resolution before the House.

said he could not avoid protesting against what he regarded as the utter unsound ness of the whole financial scheme of the present Government, and he would take every opportunity of pro testing against each detail of it. They knew that the Chancellor of the Ex chequer had consistently asserted that the proposals in regard to the sugar duty were not protective. As a matter of fact, whether the tax on molasses as originally introduced was or was not protective, it could not be denied that the right hon. Gentleman was now proposing to introduce a graduated tax on molasses; in fact, the right hon. Gentleman was now proposing three taxes for one. He was perfectly well aware that, technically speaking, the proposal of the Chancellor of the Exchequer could not be described as protective, simply because the right hon. Gentleman proposed to put on an Excise duty corresponding to the Customs duties. But he maintained that the evils which would result from these proposals were similar to the evils arising from protection pure and simple. He would point out that during the last twenty-four or twenty-six years sugar had not only become a staple article of the food of the people, but the raw material on which several small trades had been founded. Therefore to tax the raw material of these trades was to produce the very evils of which they complained from a purely protective tax. He would point out that foreign countries which gave bounties on the exports of sugar made a pure present to this country of so much sugar, and it was owing to that present that these small industries had been started. These small industries depended for their prosperity essentially on the cheapness of sugar, and that cheapness of sugar again depended on the sugar being admitted duty free. Take, for instance, the jam trade, which now employed five times the number of people that had been employed by all the sugar refineries in the country. More- over, we were able to make a profit out of the very foreign countries who made us a present of this sugar through their export bounties, and we were exporting large quantities of jam abroad.

Order, order! All that the hon. Gentleman can discuss on this resolution is the variation caused by the proposed changes in the duties on sugar substitutes and molasses.

said he would endeavour not to transgress the Chairman's ruling. He would put his point in a slightly different way. The Chancellor of the Exchequer's proposal, he maintained, would still further increase the price of sugar, and thereby produce an increased evil of the character he had indicated—an evil which existed to a small extent in the original proposals of the Budget. He would like, if he might, inasmuch as the question had been mentioned in debate, to refer to the assertion of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Wolverhampton and the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer that they claimed the authority of Mr. Gladstone in regard to an increased tax on sugar.

No authority was claimed in regard to the increase of the tax on sugar, but in regard to the imposition of a tax on sugar. The hon. Member is now trying to get round the ruling I have given.

said he was under the impression that the analogy was that Mr. Gladstone had increased the tax on sugar, not that he had imposed it. But he would leave that point, and only remark in conclusion that he trusted the leaders on that side of the House would endeavour to rid themselves of one particular attitude of mind in regard to the proposal of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that there were those who supported the sugar tax as bad finance merely because bad finance would punish those who took a different view from them in regard to the war.

said he was glad that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had intimated his intention of reducing the duty on the lower class of molasses. Treacle was largely imported for making feeding cakes for cattle, and if the duty on that treacle had been left at the very high figure in the original Budget resolution it would have practically stopped the trade and been detrimental to agriculture. He would have liked to have seen molasses not used for human food exempted from the duty altogether; but as that was impossible he thanked the Chancellor of the Exchequer for making the reduction he had done.

said that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had been very slow to convince as to the necessity of maintaining this tax on glucose. The right hon. Gentleman had disregarded the information brought to his notice in the House; and it seemed extraordinary that there should not have been some inquiry on his part as to the incidence of the duty. He should like to point out to the right hon. Gentleman that his proposal would not fully meet the case in regard to glucose. He was perfectly certain that unless the right hon. Gentleman imposed the full sugar duty on glucose it would lead to the Chancellor of the Exchequer being defrauded by foreign firms, and most assuredly it would lead to the consumer being defrauded. He would give proof of what he had stated. In the first place, the brewer would always show a great preference for the cheap article. Now that there was a differentiation between the duties on sugar and glucose he would show a greater preference than ever for the cheaper and less desirable article. But it must not be forgotten that the brewer paid a beer duty on the specific gravity of the liquid, that was to say, on the wort; and the specific gravity of the liquid produced from glucose and the specific gravity of the liquid produced from sugar was exactly the same. The result would inevitably be that we should have beer less pure than before; it would be a glucose beverage altogether; and the Chancellor of the Exchequer would not receive from the brewer the amount of taxation to which he was justly entitled. The Conservative party had always been regarded as the friends of "the trade" as it was called, and in re-arranging the burden the Chancellor of the Exchequer should consider the differentiation between the duties on sugar and glucose. What was the effect on the consumer? When the consumer purchased an article containing sugar he expected to get pure sugar, but the result of the differentiation between the duties on glucose and sugar would be that the manufacturer would displace pure sugar and put in this impure article that was already rapidly taking place, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer was encouraging this. The right hon. Gentleman showed a lamentable lack of knowledge in this matter. He admitted that glucose was largely used, and when questions were put to him as to whether it was or was not adulteration, he said he did not appear to know much about it.

I said it was illegal.

said the right hon. Gentleman said it had been appealed against, but he did not appear to know that the judgment of the court of first instance had been upheld on that appeal. We did not want to be in a state of glucose saturation; we had to drink glucose beer; we did not want glucose in everything. He strongly urged that the duty on glucose should be put up to a level with the highest sugar duty, and he hoped the Chancellor of the Exchequer would give some consideration to that matter in his reply.

said he did not understand from the speech of the Chancellor of the Exchequer what would be the result of this change in the duty so far as the Exchequer was concerned, or what would be the result so far as the revenue was concerned. When he replied the Chancellor of the Exchequer would perhaps give some consideration to that point.

said the very fact that the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposed to increased one tax by over 60 per cent. and to reduce another by 50 per cent. was a lesson to the House as to the difficulties and dangers of meddling with subjects with which, not only the Chancellor of the Exchequer, but certainly the House at large were not qualified to deal. He did not for a moment believe that the Chancellor of the Exchequer meant to do any harm to the commercial interests of the country; but the fact that within two months of the passing of taxes of this importance it was found necessary to impose such a great change should be a warning to the House not to embark in this particular form of taxation.

disclaimed any desire to embark upon a discussion of the taxation of molasses, which was a technical subject with which he was not prepared to deal. No doubt the reduction of the tax upon molasses would by some be considered a boon to the agricultural classes, but he considered if it were it was of a very qualified nature, as the particular kind of molasses affected made more fat than meat, when used as feeding stuffs. With regard to glucose and other sweetening substances akin to sugar, they should not pay a less duty than sugar, and the only question was whether this particular rise in the duty of glucose was calculated to meet that object. If a particular tax was imposed upon sugar a tax, at least equal in amount, ought to be imposed on articles of food akin to sugar. Whether such a thing would be done by this tax was extremely doubtful. He trusted that when this matter was more fully considered in Committee the Chancellor of the Exchequer would be open to conviction and amenable to such suggestions as were offered, and that he would see his way to mete out to glucose and other substances used in place of sugar the same treatment as he meted out to sugar itself.

It is my desire that, so far as the sweetening powers of sugar on one side and of glucose on the other are concerned, the duty should be equal. But my mind is absolutely open with regard to the further discuss on of the matter in Committee. I have made this proposal to the Committee, which, despite the remarks of the hon. Member for Devonport, is a very large increase in the duty on glucose, in the belief that practically sugar and solid glucose will be put on an equality. As to the effect of the changes on the revenue, the duty is increased to a large extent on solid glucose, and to a lesser extent on liquid glucose, but with regard to a very considerable part of molasses and other kinds of sugar the duty is largely lowered, and though I should think that on the whole there will be some increase on the total yield of the duties on molasses and glucose, I do not, think it will be a very large one.

said the intention of the Amendment he desired to move was to deal with the question of whether the hereditary revenues derived from the Crown lands and other sources really belonged to the King in his personal capacity or in his capacity of head of the State. In the preamble of the Bill the House was told that these had been given up by the King, but the preamble of a Bill did not make law, and the fact that in the preamble he gave them up did not give the King, in his personal capacity, any title to these hereditary revenues. He believed that no lawyer would venture to assert that these hereditary revenues belonged personally to the sovereign, except as the head and representative of the State. In 1872 a Report was made by the Treasury upon divers matters connected with finance, and in an exhaustive appendix to that Report the whole question of the hereditary revenues was treated—whence they were derived and to whom they belonged; and no one, he submitted, could read that official document without coming to the conclusion that the whole idea of the hereditary revenues belonging to the sovereign was about as much a myth as any telegram of Reuter's from the seat of war. Up to 1688 there was no such thing as a Civil List at all. Up to then the hereditary revenues belonged entirely to the State, and were devoted to the government of the State, and no distinction was made as to what the monarch was to spend on his family. What was now called the Civil List came into existence at the time of William and Mary, when the funds were voted and certain sources were reserved from which money was to be derived; but there was no pretence that they belonged to the sovereign in any way, and the House of Commons had a right to vote or refuse them as it chose. In the reign of Anne certain revenues were charged, but even then there was no idea that they in any way belonged to the sovereign. It was acknowledged then that they belonged to the country, and portions of them were taken and devoted to special purposes. In the reigns of George I. and George II. the same rule applied. In the reign of George III. the arrangement was much the same; but it was in that reign that in the preamble of the Act the King said he gave up the hereditary revenues from Crown lands, etc., and the same renunciation was performed in the preambles of the Acts of George IV., William IV., and Victoria. But could any lawyer say, after the facts which had been set forth by the official Report of 1872, that there was any right in the sovereign to hold these revenues as his own property? Such a right was not derived before the Revolution of 1688, and it was certainly not derived afterwards. The only reason the remuneration was put into the preambles of the Acts of George I., George II., and George III. was that, although those sovereigns had recognised that the larger hereditary revenues belonged to the State, they had not so recognised the smaller ones. This was considered unfair, and therefore it was specially inserted in the Civil List of William IV. that these smaller revenues, as well as the hereditary revenues, were given up. The Crown had absolutely no title to the Crown lands, or to any other hereditary revenues. The mistake had crept in apparently owing to the action of Lord Bute. If it were merely the old-fashioned mode of showing respect to the Crown, he should not have protested against it, but it was more than that. The Chancellor of the Exchequer himself had said that as a consideration for the House granting the Civil List, the Crown had given up this personal property. But that point was not taken into consideration at all. In granting the Civil List, no account was taken of the relation it would bear to the amount the Crown lands brought in, but a sum was granted which the House thought fitting to the dignity and the maintenance of the Crown. He therefore protested against this statement being dragged into one Civil List after another. There ought always to be a protest raised against it. The principle should be kept alive that the sovereign should have no personal estates, and that so far as the Crown lands, etc., were concerned the sovereign owned no personal property. He therefore moved the Amendment standing in his name.

The hon. Gentleman has given us a very learned and interesting disquisition upon the history of Crown lands, but I confess I cannot for the life of me see how his premisses lead to his conclusions, or what benefit he desires to gain for his Amendment. The hon. Member says that there is no doubt the Crown lands do not belong to the Crown. I should say there is no doubt that the Crown lands do belong to the Crown, and every lawyer in the House, I suppose, would confirm that statement. The Crown lands belong to the Crown, and the sovereign could, if he had not made renunciation like that contained in this Bill, spend the money precisely as he chose. It may be perfectly true that in the days when there was no Civil List, in the more primitive days of British Monarchy, the Crown lands not only defrayed the cost of the sovereign's household and personal expenses, but a large part of the expenses of running the government of the country. But no lawyer would say, in the absence of a renunciation by the Crown, that it would not be in the power of the Crown to spend the revenues of the Crown lands according to the will of the sovereign for the time being. Under these circumstances I cannot see what would be gained by the Amendment of the hon. Gentleman. It is in the highest degree improbable that the time will ever arrive when a sovereign of this country would

said his next Amendment dealt with the amount of money proposed to be voted by Parliament for the King's Civil List. He proposed that the amount should be £415,000 instead of £470,000. Hon. Members did not realise that the funds of the Duchy of Lancaster formed part of the Civil List and brought it up to £530,000. The late Queen Victoria was voted a Civil List of £385,000 at a time when the revenue of the Duchy of Lancaster, instead of producing £60,000 as at present, only produced £12,000. Many years ago a Liberal Government proposed £50,000 a year to the late Prince Consort, but the Conservatives at that time were so sound in certain matters connected with finance that, backed up by the Radicals in the House of Commons, the amount was reduced to £30,000. It seemed to be thought by some gentleman to be a crime of lese majesté, when the Government proposed a sum of money either for the sovereign or a royal prince, to propose a reduction. He was prepared to vote whatever sum was actually required, but he was not ready, upon vague general observations such as were found in the Report of the majority of the Civil List Committee, to vote more than he thought was really necessary. The revenues of the Duchy of Lancaster had increased largely in recent years, and taking them at £60,000, and including £30,000 for the Prince Consort, which would have remained had he lived, the Civil List of Her Majesty would have been £475,000 as against this £530,000, which they were now called upon to vote. Although that Civil List was much smaller than the one proposed now, it amply sufficed for Her Majesty. A good deal was made upon the Committee of the fact that during the last few years Class III. of the present List exceeded the amount set down in the Civil List during the last five years of Her Majesty's reign by £11,000. He thought the Chancellor of the Exchequer would admit that the expenses of His Majesty's Household did not exceed the amount at which they stood at the commencement of the reign of Queen Victoria. The ceremonial expenditure in Class II. had been reduced. The amount for salaries had been reduced by doing away with sinecure offices to the extent of £15,000, and the class had also been reduced £6,000 by the abolition of the Royal Buckhounds. The pensions which would fall to be paid were reduced by about £10,000. When the Civil List of Queen Victoria was arranged considerable reductions were made with respect to political offices, and some were abolished altogether, but that was considered in the amount. But here, though the expenditure was reduced, that was not taken into consideration in the amount. The amount of the Civil List was raised, and the amount to be paid out of it was reduced. There was the one item of "personal staff" added, which was really no addition. Personal staff in the reign of Queen Victoria came out of the privy purse, and now it was made a separate class of its own. In looking over the expenditure of the late Queen he found a large amount put down for Balmoral and Osborne. These palaces belonged to Her Majesty, but he held to the old Whig doctrine that the sovereign ought to hold no personal property of his or her own. The sovereign should give up his personal estates to relatives, if they liked, and should be entirely dependent upon the amount of money voted by the House of Commons. If they had to consider not only what was necessary for the sovereign, but also what was necessary to maintain Balmoral and Sandringham, the Civil List might be raised in order to keep up estates which were of no value to the country. The result of this was that the privy purse had increased enormously. Although there were reductions in the class, the total amount of the privy purse would be £200,000, which, with all respect to the Sovereign, he was bound to say he thought was somewhat excessive. He wished not only that the Sovereign should have enough to maintain himself in comfort, but that the Court should be conducted with decent magnifi- cence. He did not, and never would, agree to the doctrine laid down by the majority of the Committee upstairs, that they should never place any restriction upon the hospitality of the Sovereign. If that was true, they were violating their own rule in asking £470,000. If that was true, what they ought to do was to give the Sovereign power freely to draw what he wished from the Treasury. They knew that the Queen's Court was kept with what he would call decent magnificence, and he was not aware that the present Court required more. A few belonging to the privileged classes who went to the entertainments wanted more to be granted than the late Queen received. He could only say that he never heard of one of his constituents being asked to the functions. This was a little Society matter, and he thought that, in view of the lavish and ostentatious hospitality practised by certain persons in this country who had grown suddenly rich, the Court should set an example of decent hospitality.

said he was very sorry the hon. Member for Northampton had moved this Amendment. It was clearly proved in the Committee upstairs that it was most desirable, in the interest of His Majesty and of the country, that proper provision should be made for the Crown. It was considered that a large expenditure would be required to keep up the dignity and honour of the office, and that it would be far wiser that an amount should be given which would be satisfactory in that way, so that His Majesty should not be obliged to run into debt, because they had made an improper allowance to him. The King had to keep up his Court in very much the same way as other monarchs in Europe had to do. The monarchical principle was fixed in the minds of the people of Europe, and therefore it was desirable that we should keep up the Crown in exactly the same way as was done in other countries. There was only one country in Europe which at present was not a monarchy. That was France. He was in Paris when the Czar of Russia was there, and had an opportunity of mixing with the people and hearing their sentiments. The feeling he heard expressed on all sides was that they ought to have a monarchy of their own. In discussing this question they ought to consider what had been done abroad. He would give a few figures showing what other countries had done. A comparison of the expenditure equivalent to that of the Civil List in European countries showed the amounts to be:—In Russia, £2,750,382; Prussia, £785,965; Austria, £775,000; Italy, £642,000; Great Britain, including all the grants to the Royal Family, £590,000; Spain, £370,000; Bavaria, £275,158; Saxony, £188,960; Belgium, £140,000; Sweden, £112,000; Portugal, £80,300; Holland, £66,666; and Denmark, £66,200. In republican France the amount was £426,240, and in the United States £442,625. That worked out per head of the population as follows:—Saxony, 11·97d.; Bavaria, 11·35d.; Denmark, 7·27d.; Prussia, 5·92d.; Russia, 5·12d.; Spain, 4·99d.; Belgium, 4·98d.; Italy, 4·84d.; Austria, 4·16d.; Portugal, 3·82d.; Sweden, 3·72d.; Great Britain, 3·46d.; France, 2·66d.; and the United States, 1·69d. But if they took off the value of the Crown lands which was dealt with under the last Amendment it really worked out at a penny per head of the population in this country. He thought they would find that nothing could be cheaper than the amount we had to pay in this country in comparison with other countries.

said the extraordinary figures they had listened to from the hon. Baronet the Member for the Uxbridge Division certainly came as a surprise to him. There was a time in the history of this country when the Civil List included the whole cost of government, apart from the Army and Navy. The figures cited by the hon. Baronet showed that this House was asked to vote to the King and Queen a larger sum than sufficed in the United States for the entire government, including the payment of Members of Parliament.

said that if in the United States they indulged in the luxury of paying senators the cost was included in the figure he had quoted.

remarked that that was exactly his point. What the hon. Baronet invited the Committee to do was to vote for the King and Queen of England, for their own personal use, a larger sum than was given for the entire government of the United States. If the hon. Baronet was prepared to move an Amendment that King Edward should, out of his Civil List, pay the Members of this House, he would vote for the Amendment. There were two points on which he would invite the Chancellor of the Exchequer to give some information before the question went to the vote. When the subject was last under discussion he asked whether the £50,000, included in the £110,000 for the privy purse, which was supposed to be voted to the Queen, would be paid to Her Majesty direct, or to the King, leaving him to dispose of it as he saw fit. Unless the sum was to be paid to her direct, he would move a further Amendment to this clause at the proper stage. If this House voted a sum of money to Queen Alexandra, the more popular of the two—[Cries of "Oh!" and "Order!"]—he would speak the truth even if it did not please hon. Members opposite. If this House voted a sum of money to Her Majesty, they should be sure that it was paid to her direct. He also asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether the King continued to hold various commissions which he formerly held in the Army, and, if so, whether he was paid for holding these positions. He found that His Majesty was a Field Marshal on the Active List and colonel of several regiments. Evidently His Majesty did not believe in "one man one job." He should vote for the Amendment because he thought the sum which it specified was more than sufficient. The late Queen and Prince Consort, with a young and increasing family, had a total income for the privy purse of about £100,000 a year, whereas the sum that was to be voted now to the King and Queen, for whose family separate provision was made, was close on £200,000. He submitted that this was to set an example of wasteful extravagance which at a time like this would be injurious to the nation.

said it seemed to him to be idle to compare the expenditure which might take place during the present reign with what was spent towards the close of the last reign. During the last forty years the sovereign was almost practically in retirement, for reasons which they all knew. We must go back to a period not later than 1861 for the purpose of comparison. Moreover, in making such a comparison, they must remember that during the last forty years there had been a most remarkable increase in the number and extent of great properties in this country. It had been estimated that within the next thirty years, by the falling in of leases, the capital value of the property of one landlord, in a town which was not London, would be increased by £40,000,000. They knew that for many years to come there was not the slightest chance of our giving up the monarchical system in this country; and he held, from a purely democratic point of view, that it would be a danger to the country if the monarch were not among the wealthiest men in the country. The sovereign must have great influence in the State, and he was not prepared to submit the sovereign to the temptations of undue influence, and to run the risk of increasing the power of those men whose properties had become so great within the last forty years, a power that was already a social danger.

I think it is not necessary to detain the Committee at any length in regard to the proposals of the hon. Member for Northampton. The hon. Member has stated to the Committee precisely the views which he stated to the Committee upstairs, and that Committee decided against him, not merely by a majority, for he could get no one to support his views. I am not disposed to compare the Civil List with that of other countries, or to discuss the view expressed by the hon. Member who has just sat down. But I do think that the proposals which the Government submitted to the Committee upstairs, and to which that Committee agreed unanimously, with the exception of the hon. Member for Northampton, if they erred, erred on the side of moderation. I rise merely to answer a question asked by the hon. Member for Merthyr Tydvil with regard to the colonelcies held by the King in the Army. Those are purely honorary appointments. His Majesty is, I believe, colonel of more than one regiment, but he receives not one single penny in respect