90 



ANNUAL REGISTER, 1809. 



board of Ireland should either take 

 an efficient part, or be abolished 

 altogether, and these matters of 

 revenue be put under the treasury 

 of this country (England) entire- 

 ly, the abuses would never be re- 

 medied. 



The resolutions respecting 

 ways and means, moved by Mr. 

 Foster were then severally put 

 and agreed to, and afterwards, 

 in the form of bills passed into 

 laws. 



Under the head of finance, in 

 the present brief sketch of na- 

 tional affairs, it is proper to ar- 

 range the proceedings of the house 

 of commons on the fourth report 

 of the committee of public expen- 

 diture : a document of extreme 

 interest and importance, as tending 

 to illustrate the various ways in 

 which losses may accrue to the 

 public from the negligence of go- 

 vernment : the injury done to the 

 cause of patriotism and virtue in 

 general by hypocrisy; and the base 

 arts by which low and unprinci- 

 pled men may insinuate themselves 

 into the favour of a minister, and 

 obtain offices of great trust as well 

 as emolument, and confiding, on 

 too just a calculation, on ministe- 

 rial favour and forbearance, go on 

 for a long series of years to plun- 

 der the property of the public, and 

 thereby to press down and aggra- 

 vate the heavy load of taxation on 

 the uninformed, though suspecting 

 people. While this document tends 

 to show the supinenessand conniv- 

 ance which ministers are apt to 

 extend to their creatures and parti- 

 zans at the public expence, it is a 

 strong testimonial to the well-di- 



rected patriotism of the adminis- 

 tration by whom the financial com- 

 mittee was instituted. 



House of Commons, May the 

 1st. The fourth report of the com- 

 mittee of public expenditure being 

 entered as read,* on the motion of 

 Mr. Ord, thaUgentleman rose for 

 the purpose of calling the attention 

 of the house to the matters detailed 

 in that report: which were such 

 as to call for the most serious atten- 

 tion of the house. It had been too 

 much the practice he observed, to 

 pass over such reports without do- 

 ing any thing upon them; by which 

 means, the labours of committees of 

 this kind were in danger of losing 

 their credit with the public. Parlia- 

 ment had, for many years past, and 

 was likely to have for many years to 

 come, the task of imposing enormous 

 taxes on the country , therefore there 

 was no duty of the house of com- 

 mons more sacred than that of 

 watching over the expenditure of 

 the public money. Mr. Ord then 

 proceeded to state from the report, 

 that commissioners had been ap- 

 pointed in 1795 to manage, sell, 

 and dispose of the cargoes of 

 Dutch ships, detained or brought 

 in, in order to prevent those car- 

 goes from being greatly injured, or 

 totally destroyed. They had ge- 

 neral instructions as to the con- 

 duct of their transactions from the 

 lords of the privy council, requir- 

 ing them to keep minutes of all 

 their proceedings, and to keep their 

 accounts in such form as the lords 

 commissioners of the treasury 

 should direct and approve ; and in 

 case of points of any difficulty oc- 

 curring, they were to refer to the 



committee 

 See the Report in Appendix to Chronicle p. 496. 



