CHAP. IV.

Finance.-Budget.-Loan.-War Taxes.-Taxes to provide for the Interestof the Loan.-Irregularity of bringing forward the Ways and Means before the Army Estimates.-Property Tax.-Exemption of His Majesty's funded Property from the Operation of this Tax.-Pig Iron Tax.-Private Brewery Tax.-Increase of Assessed Taxes.-Assessed Taxes Allowance Bill.Irish Budget.-Regulation Bills.-Of the Office of Treasurer of the Ordnance. Of the Excise.-Customs.-Stamp Office.-Post Office.-Office of Surveyor General of Woods and Forests.-Custom-House Officer's Bill.Inaudited Public Accounts.-West India Accounts Bill.-Auditors of Public Accounts Bill.-Abuses in the Barrack Department.-Grants to the Family of Lord Nelson.-To Lord Collingwood.-Sir Richard Strachan, and Sir John Duckworth.-Royal Family Annuities Bill.-Corn Intercourse Bill-American Intercourse Bill.-Tortola Free Port Bill.-Woollen Manufacture Committee.

THES

HE new ministers, in the measures of finance, which they pursued during this session of parliament, were content with follow ing the systems, and executing the plans of their predecessors; and unless in shewing greater vigilance and anxiety for the detection and suppression of abuses, they seemed to be unambitious of any higher distinction, in this important branch of their public duty. The period of the year when they came into office, compelled them to adopt, in most instances, the estimates prepared by the former government; and in raising the ways and means for the current year, they adhered scrupulously to the principles laid down and followed by Mr. Pitt. The sinking fund for the redemption of the national debt, which many persons feared, or affected to

fear, would be far from secure in their hands, and which some persons both in and out of parliament, urged them strongly to encroach up, they determined religiously to respect.

The system of war taxes, or the plan of raising within the year a great part of the supplies necessary for the public service, they took up with zeal, and carried to an extent before unexampled. In the prosecution of this object, so meritorious in itself, and beneficial to the country, they had recourse to a measure of taxation, which bore peculiarly hard on the middling ranks of life, and on those industrious classes of society, which are removed by one degree only from indigence; and as the popu larity of one branch of the administration, lay chiefly among persons of that description, their con

duct

liament, and to the rigorous measures taken to render them effectual, that they were enabled at a future period to hold out to the country the consolatory assurance, that on the scale on which they had determined to conduct the war, no additional taxes would be necessary for carrying it on, to whatever period, however distant, it might be prolonged.

duct in this particular, excited
against them a degree of odium
and unpopularity proportioned to
the former affection and regard en-
tertained towards them. It seemed
to add to the sufferings of the peo-
ple, when the property tax was
raised to 10 per cent, and most of
the former exemptions done away,
that a measure so grinding and op-
pressive, should proceed from per-
sons, who had opposed the triple
25-essment, the income tax, and the
property tax itself, when first intro-
daced. Like the bird in the fable,
which complained less of the sharp-
zess of the point that wounded its
bosom, than of the feather that
winged and directed the arrow,
having been drawn from its own
pinion, the people felt their suffer-
ings aggravated, and exasperated by
the reflection, that they were im.
posed by those, whom they had hi-
therto cherished and supported as
their friends, and whose elevation
to power they considered (no mat-
ter how erroneously) as in some
degree their own work, or at least
as a consequence of their supposed
partiality towards them. It must
at the same time, in fairness to the
new ministers be acknowledged,
that it was owing to the heavy taxes
posed during this session of par-
The funded debt of Great Britain, not redeemed,
amounted on the 1st Feb. 1806 to

Lord Henry Petty, the new chancellor of the exchequer, opened the budget on the 28th of March, in a speech remarkable for the perspicuity of its statements and clearness of its arrangement, as well as for the professions of rigid economy, and of strict attention to the reform of abuses which it contained. He began, after some preliminary observations on the arduous task he had undertaken, by saying, that he should state to the house the amount of the public debt and charges upon it, and the produce of the consolidated fund, at the accession of the present ministers to office, that the people might be fully apprised of their situation, and prepared for the exertions and sacrifices, which he was compelled to demand from them. He then stated that

The redeemed debt by the commissioners, 101,145,802 transferred to the commissioners

by reason of the land tax redeemed, Total of the redeemed debt of Great Britain,

22,325,740

-

£. 517,280,561*

123,471,542+

*The funded debt of Ireland, not redeemed, amounted on the 18th

March, 1806, to

The imperial loans not redeemed at the same date,
Ital of the national debt not redeemed,

+ The redeemed debt of Ireland, 13th March, 1806,
The redeemed imperial loan, same date,
Tal of the redecaned debt,

F 2

35,484,052 3,027,051 555,791,664

2,913,948 642,249 127,027,739

Total

-

--

.

Total of the funded debt of Great Britain re-
deemed and unredeemed,
Total of the annual charges of the funded debt of
Great Britain and Ireland, and the imperial loans,
Total of the sums annually applicable to the redemp-
tion of the national debt,

Total of the unfunded debt, 5th Jan. 1806,
Total income of the consolidated fund in the year,
ending 5th Jan. 1806,

640,752,103*

27,485,384

7,615,167 23,168,747

33,035,501

-

29,951,639

Annual charges on the consolidated fund, as it stood on the 5th Jan. 1806,

Surplus of the consolidated fund applicable to the ge-
neral service of the state,
Produce of the war taxes in the year ending 5th Jan.
1806,

In this part of his subject the noble lord pointed out to the house, that on the 1st of Feb. 1303, the proportion of the sinking fund to the unredeemed debt, was as 1 to 82, but that on the 1st Feb. 1806, the proportion was as 1 to 68. After this it was unnecessary for him to enter into any eulogium on the sinking fund, nor to detain the house with any panegyric on its former effects, or the hopes that might be entertained of its future operations. The advantages of that fund were very sensibly felt in the prices

3,083,862

13,171,499

of stock, and in contracting for loans, which it enabled the public to obtain on better terms. Therefore, independent of considerations of good faith, which pledged the house to adhere to this system, it was bound to maintain it from po sitive and tried experience of its. utility.

The chancellor of the exchequer then proceeded to state the supplies wanted for 1806, and the ways and means by which he proposed to provide for them, as follows

Total of the national funded debt, redeemed and unredeemed, 632,819,408

Add

On account of England,

Deduct on account of Ireland, 2-17ths

of the above sum of £.43,669,000 5,137,528 Dedact also 2-17ths for civil list and

Surplus of consolidated fund to 5th April, 1807,

Deduct as likely to be outstanding at 5th