LORD REDESDALE ON THE MALT TAX 



honest Englishman desires more, but as there are 

 trading politicians who talk of much more, I do 

 not wish to be classed with such. 



" As regards the third resolution, I am in 

 favour of the total repeal of the malt tax. I 

 hold it to be a duty of which a war emergency 

 could alone justify the imposition, and great 

 agricultural and general prosperity the continuance 

 even under such emergency. It is impolitic in 

 its character, monstrous in its present amount, 

 and most injurious to the farming interest and 

 to the poor. I am, therefore, in favour of its 

 total repeal, but am of opinion that in the present 

 state of the revenue our demand should be for 

 immediate reduction and total prospective repeal. 

 It appears to me that in asking (which the Oxford 

 petition does not) for immediate repeal the agri- 

 cultural interest has for many years been led 

 into an error which has caused them to fail in 

 attaining their object. The amount of revenue 

 derived from the present duties on malt is so large 

 that no Chancellor of the Exchequer has dared 

 to encounter the financial difficulty to be created 

 by its repeal. I am convinced that if a firm 

 demand had been made for its reduction, no 

 Government could have long withstood so reason- 

 able a request, and that the duty having been 

 thus first brought to that amount which would 

 have enabled a Minister to concede it without 

 embarrassment at some time when there has 

 been a flourishing revenue, it would ere this have 

 probably been altogether repealed. As I believe 

 that no interest is more injuriously affected than 

 the landed by an empty and borrowing exchequer, 



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