TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 225 



After briefly recapitulating- the main points of the paper read at the Edinburgh 

 Meeting- last year, viz. " On a proposed Doomsday Book, gi"ving- the Value of 

 Uovernmental Property as the basis for a sound system of National Accounts," tlie 

 paper proceeded to develop still further the author's vie-n's as to the manner in 

 ■which Government departmental accounts should be prepared for the information of 

 I'arliament. In the paper read at Edinburgh, it -was suggested by the author that, 

 in addition to the main proposal of the paper, a Doomsday Book of National (as 

 distinguished from Governmental) property might also be compiled after the 

 manner of the old Doomsday Itook of ^^ illinm the Conqueror ; and this minor sug- 

 gestion had been advocated by the ' Spectator ' and oilier influential papers and 

 also by Earl Derb}^, and there seemed some probability of its being carried into 

 eft'ect. 



The great object, however, of the main proposal (i.e. of having a Doomsday 

 Book giving the value of Government property) -was to obtain thereby the basis 

 of a good system of Parliamentary and Departmental accounts, by -which expendi- 

 ture for the current purposes of the year might be distinguished from expenditure 

 ■«-hich really -tt'cnt to increase the capital of the Government — -which, for instance, 

 v.'ent to increase its land, buildings, stores, &c. 



It -was urged that there could be no eihcieut check on expenditure or the results 

 of expenditure by Parliament if disbursements for capital and for current purposes 

 were not clearly distinguished, as departments might obtain from the House 

 £•10,000,000 and expend either £11,000,000 or only 9,000,000, simply because the 

 extra million might be obtained by reducing the capital {i.e. plant, buildings, 

 stores, &c.), or by not maintaining them to their usual value, and thus £11,000,000 

 be spent for current purposes ; or £1,000,000 extra might be expended for increasing 

 the capital (in plant, buildings, stores, &c.) of the department, and thus only 

 £9,000,000 be spent for the current purposes of the year in question. 



The author pointed out in detail how the various departmental accoimts should 

 be compiled, so as to give the heads of Departments and Parliament greater control, 

 so that they might see not merely that the money was disbursed to the proper 

 recipients, and that there was no malappropriation, but that they have value for 

 the money expended — that is, Expense or [Statistical accounts of some kind (and 

 the author pointed out how this could be done) should be compiled to show the 

 results of expenditure. 



To object to the expense of obtaining this information appeared like objecting 

 to have reins to drive the coach on account of the expense of such reins, and 

 electing to let the horse and coach take their own course. 



In illustration, the author pointed out that between the years 1863 and 1866 he 

 had discovered, and Mr. Secly had mentioned in the House of Commons, about 

 thirty ships -n-hich had been repaired during that time by the Admiralty, the cost 

 of such repairs being about equal to the sum for which similar new ships could 

 have been bought. It was a rough rule with shipbuilders that an old repaired 

 ship was worth about half as much as a similar new ship, so that there had been 

 a loss on these ships of some hundreds of thousands of pounds. An account of 

 theni would bo found in the Appendix to the Eeport of Mr. Seely's Committee of 

 the House of Commons of 1808, " On Admiralty Monies and Accoimts." 



This was now obviated by the system of Expense accounts and by the way they 

 are utilized at the Admiralty, so that such cases could not well occur again. 



In the author's opinion three things were necessary for a perfect check : — 



1st, audit of cash ; 2nd, audit of stores, as to quantity, for stores are money's 

 value, and an audit of them is as necessary as an audit of cash ; 3rd, Expense or 

 Statistical accounts showing the results of expenditure in ships built, repaired,^ 

 articles produced, or in other results. Without this we may have perfect audit of 

 cash ; and of stores we may see that the stores said to have been used to a ship have 

 been so used, and yet they"may have been used very improperly, or may have been 

 employed uselessly, as in the cases of excessive cost of repairs of ships given in 

 this paper, or expensive stores or labour may be used where inexpensive stores or 

 labour would suflfice. In fact gold may be used instead of iron, and hundreds of 

 thousands of ])ounds be wasted in this way ; and the heads of Departments and 

 the House of Commons, seeing that they have a perfect check or audit of cash and 



