MR. A. M'ARTHUR, in supporting the Amendment of the hon. Member for Hackney, said, he hoped the House would never abdicate its right or ignore its responsibility to look very narrowly into the principles of legislation affecting India, and examine closely the Financial Statements that were presented to them. There was great reason to complain of the delay that had arisen in bringing forward the Indian Budget this year. The hon. Member was about to refer to matters of detail with regard to the establishment of an Indian Museum, when

SIR GEORGE BOWYER rose to Order, and wished to know whether it was competent to the hon. Member to enter upon such a subject at that moment?

MR. SPEAKER: The original question before the House was, that this House do resolve itself into a Committee to consider the Financial Statement of the Government on the East India Revenue Accounts, since which the hon. Member for Hackney has moved an Amendment with reference to the time when that statement should be made. Although I cannot say that the hon. Member for Leicester is out of Order in his remarks, I submit that the more convenient course would be to discuss the Amendment immediately before the House, and to reserve for the Committee the consideration in detail of the Financial Statement.

sorry he had not been able to suc- | Indian Budget at an earlier period of ceed in carrying out that intention. the Session. The hon. Member for Hackney was a little inconsistent when he charged the Government with a settled determination to ignore all Indian matters, because they had not been able to realize their intention of bringing the Budget forward at an earlier period. The hon. Gentleman had criticized the appointment of the Select Committee to which he had referred, but did he remember that he supported the Motion for its appointment in 1870, which was carried against the Government of the day by a majority of 1 only? Under those circumstances it was not fair of the hon. Member to blame the Government for appointing a Committee which he himself had been the chief means of inducing the House of Commons to press for. The hon. Member had also blamed the Government for increasing the charges upon the Indian Revenues by bringing in a Bill to throw upon them the pension of the Auditor; but the fact was, that whereas formerly the Secretary of State had power to give the Auditor such a pension as he thought fit, under the Bill the amount of the pension would be fixed. He trusted that, after the explanation he had given, the hon. Member would allow the Business of the evening to proceed without further delay. He admitted readily enough that it would be much better if the Indian Budget could be laid before the House earlier in the Session, but owing to the press of Public Business this Session it had been found impossible to bring it MR. GRANT DUFF said, he felt forward at an earlier date. The mere great regret that he was unable to supfact of bringing on the Financial State-port the Amendment of his hon. Friend ment so late in the Session did not em- the Member for Hackney. In one rebarrass Indian finance, and he doubted spect, it would no doubt be more conveif one in a thousand in India knew there nient to have the Budget brought forwas such a thing as a Financial State- ward in the middle of the Session, but ment in the House of Commons. Ex- that course would be very unpopular cept on one occasion the Financial with the great majority of hon. MemStatement had not been made during bers. ["No, no!"] That opinion had the last four years before August, been forced upon him by a great deal of and therefore if it had been so detri- consideration which he had given to the mental to India to discuss it in August, subject. If this matter was not brought as some hon. Gentlemen had said, the forward in the middle of the Session, it condition of Indian finance would have must be brought forward at the end, deteriorated; but, on the contrary, In- or very early at the commencement. dian finance and Indian credit had Yielding to pressure, the late Governnever occupied a more favourable posi-ment on one occasion tried the experition than they did at present. He should, however, in future do his best to secure an opportunity for bringing forward the

ment of bringing the Budget forward in February. That caused much inconvenience in India, and also at the India

Office. And what was the result? Not | braced the Actual Accounts for the year a single person was present in the House 1873-4, the Regular Estimate of 1874-5, who would not have been present if it and the Budget Estimate of 1875-6. had been brought forward in August. Indian accounts were published in such a The amount of special interest on the shape as to show not only the ordinary, part of the House in Indian matters was but also the extraordinary expenditure. not very great, and the amount of it Their form of account differed from that was fixed. It could not be increased or adopted by any great commercial comlessened by the time of the Session at pany, inasmuch as it debited against the which the Budget was brought forward. annual Revenue, Expenditure which That being so, although personally he ought more properly to be placed against would like to see a change in this respect the Capital account. He proposed, in Parliamentary procedure, he thought therefore, in considering the Estimates it was a great pity that year after year and Accounts of Revenue and Expendiso much was said on the subject. It ture, first to exclude the expenditure for seemed to him not only impolitic, but Public Works Extraordinary, and then almost mischievous, for the hon. Mem- to take that expenditure by itself-an ber, or any person speaking with the arrangement which would conduce to a authority which a seat in that House clearer understanding of the state of gave him, to speak of the postponement the Indian finances. In doing so, he of the Indian Budget to the end of the would take credit on the part of the Session as anything like an insult to the Government of India for the safety of people of India. That, he humbly sub- their Estimates of Revenue, which was mitted, was a most unfortunate form of very clearly shown by the different expression. The truth of the matter stages through which the Estimates was simply this-The postponement of and accounts of the Indian Government the Indian Budget was only a necessary passed. For not only did the Regular detail of English Parliamentary pro- Estimate of Revenue show in this, as in ceedings, and he did not believe that preceding years, a large gain upon the any living creature in the Indian Penin- Budget Estimate, but we might, in addisula would ever have attached any im- tion, confidently anticipate that the full portance to it if it had not been for the increase of the Revenue would not be manner in which the subject had been shown until the Regular Estimate had constantly raised in the House. It would passed into the last stage of Actual be better to bring it forward in the Accounts. month of June, but if it could not be conveniently brought forward in June, then let it be brought forward in August.

He would first give the Committee the Actual figures for 1873-4, and would compare them with the Regular Estimate of 1873-4.

It was estimated last year that the Revenue of the year would amount to £49,478,795, and the Expenditure to £51,531,408, showing a deficit of ordinary Revenue over ordinary Expenditure of £2,052,613. The Actual Accounts showed an increase of Revenue over the Regular Estimate of £119,458, and a decrease of expenditure of £125,487, thus making a gain of £244,945. The deficit was, therefore, reduced from £2,052,613 to £1,807,668. Comparing those figures with the Actual figures of the preceding year, they arrived at the following result:-that there was a decrease of Revenue of £621,000, which was accounted for by the abolition of the income tax in that year. The Land and Opium Revenue of 1872-3 were exceptionally high; but the other chief heads of receipt showed a small

but satisfactory increase. The Actual figures of 1873-4 showed that the Famine expenditure was £3,864,673, while the total increase of expenditure, including the Famine expenditure, was £2,952, 104. If they deducted, therefore, the exceptional Famine expenditure from the ordinary expenditure of the year, there was a decrease of ordinary expenditure of £912,569. Not including the Public Works Extraordinary or the Famine Expenditure, they found that the ordinary Revenue this year showed a surplus of £2,057,005 over the ordinary expenditure.

The Budget Estimate of last year had now become the Regular Estimate of this year, and he would now compare the Budget Estimate for 1874-5 with the Regular Estimate for 1874-5. The Budget Estimate of Revenue was £48,984,000. The Regular Estimate was £50,070,410, showing an increase of £1,086,410. The Budget Estimate of Expenditure was £50,372,000, and the Regular Estimate of expenditure was £50,564,000, showing an increase of £192,000. But that increase was almost entirely due to the construction of the narrow gauge railway to Tirhoot, which cost £185,000. The Regular Estimate, therefore, was £894,000 better than the Budget Estimate of last year, and the deficit of £1,388,000 was reduced to £494,000. But he was happy to say he had that day received a telegram from the Viceroy, giving a very good account of the prospects of the year, and expressing a hope that the deficit, first estimated at £1,388,000, and now reduced to £494,000, would ultimately grow into a surplus. That was all the more satisfactory, inasmuch as the Famine had caused a falling off of £320,700 in the land revenue, while there had also been a decrease of £96,000 in the Customs.

an increase of £109,000 over the Estimate of last year, while there had been also a decrease in the working expenses of £11,000, making the total increase on the salt revenue £120,000. The sliding scale, which, as he had explained last year, it was necessary to introduce in the districts where the preventive line was abolished, had worked well. There had been a considerable reduction of the salt duties in certain districts, and the whole of that reduction had gone into the pockets of the people. The railways were cheapening salt and extending its consumption, and he was sanguine enough to believe that in a few years they would be able to abolish the whole of the preventive line, and thus to place the salt revenue on a more equable footing.

The surplus shown by the Regular Estimate, if they excluded the Famine expenditure, amounted to £1,945,647. But the second portion of the Famine expenditure had to be borne in this financial year, and that entailed an expenditure amounting to £2,440,136. And here he might observe that it was a matter of congratulation that the happiest results had attended the exertions of Lord Northbrook, the hon. Gentleman opposite (Sir George Campbell), and Sir Richard Temple to save the lives of the people from starvation. A contrast had been drawn, which was not to be wondered at, between the Famine expenditure in Bengal and that in the North-West Provinces. He could explain in a few words how the expenditure in the former case was so much heavier than in the latter. Last year, in bringing in the Bill to raise money for the Famine, he stated that the Government of India felt serious anxiety concerning one part of Bengal alone-namely, the part situated between the Ganges and Nepaul, where the population was very The other items of Revenue exhibited dense, and there the means of commua satisfactory increase, but the increase nication were very deficient. The diswhich would most interest the Commit-tricts were under another disadvantage, tee was that derived from the salt revenue. Last year the Government of India made an experiment by the abolition of the preventive line in certain districts. It was estimated that that would entail a loss of £100,000 to the Revenue, but the actual loss had been only £40,000. But so satisfactory had been the growth of the salt revenue in other parts of India that there had been

for, in ordinary years, so far from im-
porting food, they exported large quan-
tities of rice and grain. Around these
famine districts was an outer fringe of
territory, in which want and scarcity,
but not famine, was anticipated.
this outer fringe were those portions of
the North-West Provinces affected by
the drought. There was a very abun-
dant harvest in the Punjaub, and in

In

terest the House of Commons in Indian | the Famine Expenditure, which was of finance; but he (Lord George Hamilton) a very exceptional character, amounting felt bound to say that most of the Motions to £6,304,000, we had a surplus during which were brought forward in that those seven years of about £11,000,000. House with reference to India were not made with a view to economy, but rather with the object of getting money. It was the fashion to attack the Indian Government for their military expenditure, but it was in no small measure due to the guarantee clause which that House had imposed upon the India Office, and by which the Indian Government was bound to pay, promote, and pension all the officers handed over to them from the East India Company, whether they required their services or not. The increase on account of the interest guaranteed on railways was more nominal than real, inasmuch as last year there was an immense amount of grain carried by the Indian railroads, which swelled the traffic receipts. The Government had, to a certain extent, benefited by those increased receipts; but then it should be borne in mind that there were other items of Revenue in which a loss was caused by the Famine. The loss by exchanges was very serious; but whether it was due to the substitution in Germany of a gold for a silver standard, or any other extraneous cause, he did not propose at present to discuss. He thought it pointed to the wisdom of one of the principles laid down last year in a despatch from the Secretary of State for India to the Governor General. That despatch intimated that if the Indian Government wished to borrow for Public Works, it would be better to borrow in India than in England. As to Home Charges he did not think the charges on the establishment had much increased; the increase under the head of super-panies who should receive the guarantee annuation allowances being simply a

matter of account.

Summing up, then, the accounts for the year 1875-6, we found that the Revenue showed a satisfactory increase, and that the Expenditure, though swollen, still left a fair margin of £500,000 of Ordinary Revenue over Ordinary Expenditure. A great deal had been said about the chronic deficit of the Indian Government; but, taking the figures from the years 1869-70 to 1875-6, the surplus for the seven years, even including the expenditure for the Famine, was no less than £4,695,000. If we excluded

The most important head of Expenditure was, no doubt, that on Public Works. There were two parties in the House one, represented by the hon. Member for Cambridge (Mr. Smollett), objected to any expenditure for Public Works; and the other, represented by the hon. Baronet the Member for Manchester (Sir Thomas Bazley), wished the Government to spend £20,000,000 a-year. No one would dispute that it was the duty of Government to construct Public Works; but it was always a difficult question to decide where a Government should stop and private enterprize begin. As, however, there was not much private enterprize in India, more depended on the Government than would otherwise be the case, or than would be necessary some years hence when private enterprize had been stimulated. It was the special duty of the Indian Government to construct works of general utility and of a remunerative character, for the Indian Government was the owner of the soil of the country, and derived a very large revenue from it. They were much in the position of a landlord who, possessing a large property, determined by opening it out, to increase its value, although aware that the actual tolls levied on the roads constructed, might not compensate him for the cost of their construction. Lord Dalhousie, first perceiving the enormous advantage of introducing the railway system into India, made certain proposals to the Court of Directors, and suggested that railways should be constructed by com

of Government. His proposals were accepted in the main, though with many modifications which were not favourable to the Indian Government. There were two reasons why it was then necessary to entrust the construction of railroads to guaranteed companiesfirst, they would not have been undertaken by private enterprize without a guarantee; and, second, the East India Company could not themselves have constructed them without exceeding their borrowing powers in England. Therefore, the guarantee system was almost the only way in which money could be