The Framework of Home Rule Part 18

With regard to other Irish services, I shall make use, with Professor Oldham's consent, of some interesting tables compiled by him, showing the princ.i.p.al variations in Irish expenditure since the year 1891-92.[129]

They include certain expenses which I have already alluded to, and others which I shall have to remark upon further, besides giving a general view of the growth in the cost of Irish government. Neither of lists A or B is exhaustive:

A. INCREASES OF EXPENDITURE.

1910-11. 1891-92.

1. Old Age Pensions 2,408,000 -- 2. Primary Education 1,632,000 843,755 3. Universities and Colleges 166,000 26,000 4. Payments to Local Taxation Account 1,477,500 399,260

5. Ireland Development Grant 191,500 --

6. Post Office 1,404,500 749,046 7. Cost of collecting Irish Revenue 298,000 223,362 8. Surveys of the United Kingdom 81,000 47,603

9. Land Commission 414,500 91,826 10. Department of Agriculture 415,000 44,630 11. Other items (five[130]) 240,500 172,918 --------- --------- 8,728,500 2,598,400

Nos. 1 to 4 I have already dealt with, but it is interesting to note the contrasting figures of 1893-94.

No. 5. The Ireland Development Grant of 191,500 is interesting as an example of the haphazard methods of Anglo-Irish finance. It is an annual sum voted for various development purposes, and was originally established (at the figure of 185,000) in 1903 as an equivalent for the capitation grants for school attendance in England, given under the Education Act of 1902 in lieu of school fees. In allotting the Irish equivalent, Mr. Goschen's proportion of 80, 11, 9 was for the first time condemned by all parties. What the proportion ought to be was a matter of dispute, but it was fixed in this case on the basis of population.

Since the English grant has now risen to 2,500,000, the Irish proportion therefore is now, strictly speaking, inadequate.

Nos. 6, 7, and 8 are examples of charges debited by the Treasury against Ireland which are open to criticism as long as the Union lasts, and which meet with much complaint in Ireland. Obviously, however, the first two at any rate are charges which an Ireland financially independent would have to bear.

No. 9. The Land Commission vote of 414,500 is of course the direct result of an abnormally bad system, necessitating abnormal and costly remedial administration. Ireland herself is not morally responsible for a penny of it, but if she is wise she will shoulder the cost as a corollary of responsible government. Small administrative economies may be made, and the cost will disappear altogether with the completion of Land Purchase, say in fifteen years, but in the immediate future no reduction can be counted on with certainty. The figure given includes the cost of the Land Commission proper, which deals with Judicial Rents and manages finance, as well as the cost of the Estates Commissioners who conduct the machinery of Land Purchase. It also includes losses on the flotation of Land Stock at a discount, and the interest and sinking-fund on the Stock raised to pay the bonus to landlords.

No. 10. The vote of 415,000 for the Department of Agriculture, whose origin and functions I described in Chapter IX., does not accurately show the actual cost of the Department, because it excludes the greater part of an Endowment Income of 166,000 a year, derived partly from the Irish Church Fund, partly from the Irish Local Taxation Account, and partly from the interest on a capital endowment of 200,000, as well as other small miscellaneous grants. But it includes a sum of about 44,000 for some museums, colleges, gardens, etc., whose English counterparts are subsidized under different votes, as well as the sum of 144,000 for the Congested Districts Board.[131] Nor does this latter sum represent the full cost of the Congested Districts Board, which has also an Endowment Income from the Irish Church Fund of 41,250, a subsidy from the Ireland Development Grant, and a fluctuating income from various sources--rents, etc.

Part of the expense of the Department itself must be regarded as abnormal, in view of the extraordinarily backward economic condition of the country when it was founded. Nor, valuable as the Department's work is, can it be safely a.s.sumed that the cost is not extravagant. As long as any Department relies on an Imperial vote there can be no certainty that the expenditure will be economical. The whole cost of the Congested Districts Board is abnormal. Its very existence is evidence of the failure of external government in Ireland, and, as I urged in Chapter IX., the whole question of the treatment of the congested districts needs thorough investigation at the hands of a responsible Irish Government.

B. REDUCTIONS IN EXPENDITURE.

1910-11. 1891-92.

1. Relief of Distress 5,000 183,675 2. Pauper Lunatics Grant 111,655 3. Teachers' Pensions Grant 90,000 4. Railways (Ireland) Grant 61,000 341,934 5. Local Government Board 92,500 132,748 6. Chief Secretary's Offices 27,500 39,681 7. Registrar-General's Office 13,000 29,926 8. Justice and Police 2,090,500 2,129,849 --------- --------- 2,289,500 3,059,468

Most of these reductions are deceptive. No. 1 is the saving of an abnormal grant, Nos. 2 and 5 signify mere transfers to Grants in Aid of Local Taxation, No. 7 a transfer of duties to the Department of Agriculture.

The table shows a total reduction of 769,968, while Table A shows a total increase of 6,130,000. Together they account for an increase since 1891-92 of 5,360,032.

Here is a similar table, confined to Justice and Police:

C. EXPENDITURE ON JUSTICE AND POLICE.

1910-11. 1891-92.

1. Judicial Salaries ... ... ... 102,000 110,244 2. Dublin Metropolitan Police ... 93,500 91,998 3. Royal Irish Constabulary ... ... 1,371,000 1,362,348 4. Judicial Pensions, etc. ... ... 15,000 18,656 5. Law Charges ... ... ... ... 65,500 71,977 6. Superior Courts Offices ... ... 110,500 116,851 7. County Courts Offices ... ... 109,000 112,895 8. Prisons, etc. ... ... ... ... 112,000 134,429 9. Reformatories, etc. ... ... ... 112,000 110,451

2,090,500 2,129,849

To Nos. 1, 2, and 3 I have already referred. The whole charge of two millions, though it shows a slight decrease in twenty years, is grossly out of proportion to the resources of Ireland. Under heads 6 and 7 are included a number of posts which are notoriously little more than sinecures.

To sum up once more, the cost of the Irish Government as paid out of the common purse in the last completed financial year was 11,344,500, or 2 11s. 9d. per head of the population, as compared with a cost per head of 1 9s. 2d. in England, and in Scotland of 1 13s. 31/2d. But this is not the minimum figure with which we have to reckon in considering the Home Rule scheme; some items show a marked increase in the Estimates of the current year: (1) The increase in Old Age Pensions, not certain yet, will be at least 250,000. (2) The Land Commission is 544,000, as compared with 414,500. (3) Universities and Colleges, 186,256, as compared with 166,000. (4) Department of Agriculture, 426,609, as compared with 415,000. (5) Registrar-General's Office, 29,020, as compared with 13,000. (6) Valuation and Boundary Survey, 44,581, as compared with 30,000. (7) Public Works and Buildings in Ireland, 273,370, as compared with 215,000. Even with allowance for over-estimates, especially in the last of these items,[132] we must antic.i.p.ate an increase of nearly half a million under the above heads, to which we must add 150,000 recently allocated by the Road Board to Ireland for the year 1911-12, and 34,750 already allocated by the Development Commissioners. If Ireland comes prematurely into the National Insurance scheme, and a.s.sumes eventual financial responsibility for her share of the cost, that will be an additional source of expense; but it is to be hoped that her leaders, in common prudence, will henceforth endeavour to stem the rising flood of Irish expenditure, and so facilitate the retrenchments imperatively necessary under Home Rule.

As it is, the total outgoings of the current year (1911-12), swelled by the increases shown above, will probably amount to 12,000,000, while this total will in its turn be added to by the office costs of the Irish Legislature and the salaries of Ministers.

The scheme framed cannot a.s.sume immediate economies, and a responsible Ireland alone can decide the nature and extent of the drastic economies which must be made in the future. Beyond the brief remarks and hints made in the course of this chapter, I myself venture only to lay down the broad proposition that, to the last farthing, Irish revenue must govern and limit Irish expenditure. For any hards.h.i.+p entailed in achieving that aim Ireland will find superabundant compensation in the moral independence which is the foundation of national welfare. She will be sorely tempted to sell part of her freedom for a price. At whatever cost, she will be wise to resist.

If Irish revenue is to be the measure of Irish expenditure, it follows that it must be wholly, or at any rate predominately, under Irish control. Let us look a little more closely, therefore, into its amount and composition.

III.

IRISH REVENUE.

As I have already pointed out, in order to arrive at the present revenue of Ireland, our best course is to take the mean tax revenue of the two years 1909-10 and 1910-11, and to add to it the non-tax revenue of 1910-11, which was, of course, unaffected by the delay in pa.s.sing the Budget of 1909. For clearness, however, I first set out separately the Irish figures of these two years, distinguis.h.i.+ng between tax revenue and non-tax revenue, and giving the "collected" revenue and the "true"

revenue in different columns:

1909-10. 1910-11.

Revenue as Revenue as Collected. "True." Collected. "True"

TAX REVENUE.

Customs 2,742,000 2,755,000 3,103,000 2,977,000 Excise 4,487,000 2,898,000 5,826,000 3,734,000 Estate, etc., Duties 684,000 684,000 1,144,000 1,144,000 Stamps 293,000 315,000 326,000 351,000 Income Tax 388,000 451,000 1,825,000 2,164,000 Land Value Duties -- -- 1,000 1,000

Total Irish Revenue from Taxes 8,594,000 7,103,000 12,225,000 10,371,000

NON-TAX REVENUE.

Postal Service 900,000 900,000 935,000 935,000 Telegraph Service 180,000 180,000 185,500 185,500 Telephone Service 30,000 30,000 35,000 35,000 Crown Lands 26,000 26,000 24,500 24,500 Miscellaneous 116,000 116,000 114,500 114,500

Total Irish Non-Tax Revenue 1,252,000 1,252,000 1,294,500 1,294,500

Aggregate Irish 9,846,000 8,355,000 13,519,500 11,665,500 Revenue

Percentage of the Aggregate Revenue of the United Kingdom 7.52 6.38 6.57 5.67

On p. 276 are the details of the mean tax revenue, "collected" and "true," of the two years 1909-10, 1910-11, with the non-tax revenue of the latest year, 1910-11, added to them.

PRESENT IRISH REVENUE (MEAN OF THE LAST TWO YEARS).

Details of Revenue. Mean Collected Mean "True" or Tax "Contributed" Tax Revenue of the Revenue of the Years 1909-10, Years 1909-10, 1910-11. 1910-11.

TAX REVENUE.

Indirect{Customs 2,922,500 2,866,000 Taxation{Excise 5,156,500 3,316,000 (incl. licences 284,500)

Total Indirect Taxation 8,079,000 6,182,000

{Estate Duties 914,000 914,000 Direct Taxation{Stamps 309,500 333,000 {Income Tax 1,106,500 1,307,500 {Land Value Duties 1,000 1,000