THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



517 



Thos. Wenman, Wadhurst ; Mr. Austen, Tunbridge ; Mr. 

 J. B. Newinston, Wadhurst ; Mr. Henry Kemp, Sale- 

 hurst ; Mr. Parriss, Fraiit ; Mr. Ilarmer, Wadhurst ; Mr. 

 John Hodges, Tunbridge Wells; Mr. Smith, Icklesham; 

 Mr. .John White; Mr. Hartridge, Marden ; Mr. Waite, 

 Tunbridge; Mr. Smith, Lamberhurst; Mr. Waterliam, 

 Br^nchley; Mr. Apps, Brightling; Mr. Tompsett, May- 

 field; Mr. Ambrose Dunk, Rolvington; Mr. George 

 Hayward, Doubell ; Mr. Moneypenny, Benenden ; Mr. 

 Charles Verrall, Lewes ; the representative of Messrs. Pat- 

 tenden and Smith, &c., &c., &c. 



Mr. M. Body moved that the Hon, Mr. Brand; one of 

 the members for Lewes, take the chair. 



J. G. DoDSON, Esq., seconded the motion, which was 

 carried by acclamation. 



The following memorial was unanimously adopted by the 

 meeting : 



" To THE Right Honourable the Lords Commis- 

 sioners OF Her Majesty's Treasury. 



" The Humble Memorial of the undersigned Hop-planters 

 and others interested in the Cultivation of Hops, 



" Sheweth — 



" That, at a public meeting held at Tunbridge Wells on 

 Friday, the 5th Nov., by a numerous body of hop-planters 

 from Sussex, the Weald, and East Kent, it was unani- 

 mously resolved to memorialize j'our Lordships, and most 

 respectfully, but most earnestly, to entreat your Lordships 

 to take into your serious consideration the position of ex- 

 treme difficulty and embarrassment in which, owing to the 

 disastrous operations of the excise hop duty, your memo- 

 rialists now find themselves ; and to pray you to avert, by 

 the timely repeal of that impost, the distress, and in many 

 cases the ruin, in which a continued enforcement of that 

 tax must inevitably involve a number of industrious and 

 respectable agriculturists engaged in the cultivation of hops. 



" Unfortunately, the body whom j^our memorialists re- 

 present have too frequently, of late years, been compelled to 

 appeal to your Lordships, to ask for indulgence, in conse- 

 quence of the injurious pressure of the duty; and on those 

 occasions the facts and arguments bearing upon the question 

 have been so fully proved before you, that your memorial- 

 ists feel it would be only needlessly trespassing upon your 

 Lordships to recapitulate the grounds or reproduce the facts 

 upon which such appeals have been based. Your memo- 

 rialists, therefore, will merely now briefly allude to the 

 broad arguments affecting the question of the excise duty 

 and its general bearing on the hop-growers, and state the 

 practical result which the operations of the impost, coupled 

 with several years of abundant crops, have at last brought 

 about. 



" Your memorialists beg to point out that the market 

 price of hops is not regulated by the fact that a duty of 2d. 

 per lb. (or say 19s. per cwt.) is paid upon them. The 

 market value of hops is reguluted by supply and demand ; 

 and as the demand is, so to speak, maiuly limited by the 

 consumption of beer, it follows that in years of abundant 

 hop-growths the supply is in excess, and the market price 

 falls naturally to a very low figure, without any reference to 

 the amount paid per cwt. as excise duty. The practical 

 effect of this is, that the duty comes out of the pocket of the 

 planter, instead of being, as is the rule with other duty- 

 paid commodities — both in principle and practice — paid by 

 the -consumer. Your memorialists are well aware that they 

 will be met with the argument that ' all duties are ulti- 



mately paid by the consumer;' but it is an important fea- 

 ture in this case, and will be found, on close investigation, 

 an unassailable fact, that the excise duty ou hops forms an 

 exception to the rule. Your memorialists place this point 

 in the front of the argument, because it is upon the opera- 

 tion of this 'exception' that so much of injustice, and of 

 the imequal and injurious pressure of the duty, rests. The 

 state of things which obtains at present will supply a 

 striking illustration of the operation of the duty. Sussex 

 hops are now selling from 40s. for ordinary to 568. per cwt. 

 for the very finest marks. Deduct the amount of the duty 

 (say 19s.) and the net price would be 21s. and 37s. per cwt. 

 Now, as the prime cost of producing these hops would ex- 

 ceed 48s. per cwt., it follows that, at the highest price just 

 quoted, the planter is subject to heavy loss. Your memo- 

 rialists confidently maintain that the market price would be 

 little, if at all, influenced by that fact, were there no excise 

 duty on hops, since the price is alone regulated by supply 

 and demand, except in so far as the effect of the duty, as 

 hereinafter explained, is to disturb the market, and drive 

 down prices. 



" Again, as to the unequal and unfair operation of the tax 

 The hops of Mid and East Kent fetch from 6O3. to 1203. at 

 this moment, and as only the same duty is levied on them as 

 on all other hops the produce of this country, it is clear that 

 while the impost is a tax of only some 15 or 30 per cent, on 

 the selhng prices of such hops, it becomes a tax of at least 35 

 to 60 per cent, on that of Sussex growths. In other words, 

 while the duty forms from a sixth to a third part of the price 

 obtained by the grower of Kent hops, it swallows up from a 

 third to one-half that realized by the Sussex planter. 



'•■ The operation of the tax is also most injurious, inasmuch 

 as owing to its collection at stated periods. May and Novem- 

 ber, it causes the market to be glutted at those times, in order 

 to enable the planter to raise the needful funds. In the years 

 of abundance the pressure caused by having to pay the enor- 

 mous levies of the Escise collector is doubly onerous, and your 

 memorialists do not hesitate to assert that the market value 

 of hops in such years is driven down to an extent absolutely 

 ruinous by the artificial pressure thus super-added to the 

 natural depreciation which abundance itself causes. When to 

 these statements is added the fact that the hop grower, owing 

 to the singularly delicate and precarious character of the plant, 

 is wholly unable to calculate from year to year the quantity 

 his hop garden will produce, and that he consequently cannot 

 form even an approximate estimate of the amount of duty he 

 may be called upon to pay, nor of the value of the crop he will 

 have to dispose of, your memorialiata conceive that they have 

 briefly placed before your Lordships the leading circumstances 

 that affect the case. 



"As regards the present painfully embarrassed position of 

 the planters, very little explanation will be necessary to point 

 out the events by which it has been brought about. It arises 

 from the effect of four years of abundant crop— from the low 

 prices realized, as the natural result of such abundance— cou- 

 pled with the enormous sums called for as Excise duty— and 

 from the artificially enhanced pressure upon the markets, caused 

 by the necessity of providing those sums. It may be added 

 also with perfect truth that an additional source of the 

 planters' distress is due to the course pursued in 1854, when 

 the Government reduced the Customs duty by more than half, 

 and let in a large quantity of foreign hops, thereby driving 

 down the price of hops of British growth. Your memorialists 

 do not pretend to express any opinion whatever on the general 

 subject of the protective or Customs duty, but they unhesi- 

 tatingly condemn the principle acted upon in 1854, when that 



