TRANSACTIONS OP SECTION F. 463 



ing proDlem indeed. The 1,065,645 people in the United Kingdom who are 

 under poor relief (1910), the many thousands of men and women we find in large 

 towns and cities without employment, can be well occupied by the introduction of 

 sugar-beet cultivation. If we introduce this gigantic industry in this country 

 we would employ over 160,000 men in our sugar factories, about 200,000 men 

 would find employment in the trades that work in connection with the sugar 

 industry, and another 240,000 men would find additional employment in tho 

 fields. Taking it all round, by the work provided by the introduction of the 

 beet-sugar industry 600,000 men would find employment, representing 450,000 

 families, which at four per family would mean that 1,800,000, equal to 4 per 

 cent, of the whole population, would be interested in the beet-sugar industry. 

 Our position in the world depends upon maintaining a large rural population. 

 We all read the sore and disquieting accounts of the depopulation of different 

 districts in our islands. This ever-increasing exodus, which robs the country of 

 the best healthy working men and women and a sturdy agricultural population 

 and drives them into other countries, where they find more favourable economic 

 conditions and where they work in competition against us, could be stopped. 

 The sugar-beet is most admirably adapted for small holdings. No other crop 

 is so suitable, because sugar-beet can be grown year after year on the same 

 land or with rotation. 



To cover our demand for sugar we require five hundred factories to supply 

 us with sugar : each factory would cost 80,000?., so that 40,000,000?. might be 

 safely and profitably invested at home. The 25,000,000?. sterling we send year 

 by year to foreign countries would remain here, increase our wealth, benefit 

 British agriculture, British trade and commerce, and British capital and labour. 

 The high dividends paid during the last years by most Continental beet-sugar 

 factories show the profitability of this industry. Our export of capital has 

 already reached excessive dimensions. To produce all the sugar we consume 

 we would require about a million acres to be cultivated with beet, which we 

 could easily reclaim from the land that went out of cultivation during the last 

 decade. In the progress of economic thought and study, and mainly through 

 the efforts and zeal of practical British economists, the bounties which have 

 been a menace for over thirty years have been abolished since September 1, 1903. 

 With the introduction of the beet-sugar industry there would go hand in hand 

 the creation of the sugar-engineering industry and the agricultural-implement 

 industry. To give an example of what would be required if we produced all 

 the sugar we consume, I may mention that twelve million tons of beetroot 

 would be necessary, one million tons of coal, 600,000 tons of limestone, 70,000 

 tons of coke, twenty million bags, four million cases, and an immense quantity 

 of other materials. 



MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 4. 



Discussion on the Public Finances of Ireland. 

 (i) By Professor C. H. Oldham, B.A., B.L. 



This paper attempted to give an accurate statement of facts, apart from the 

 controversies which the facts have occasioned. Arrears of taxes for 1909-10 

 were collected in 1910-11, so the present tax-revenue is taken to be the mean 

 of both years. Add non-tax revenue as in 1910-11. We thus get 10,032, 000?. for 

 the present revenue 'contributed' by Ireland. In 1910-11 the expenditure in 

 Ireland was 11,344. 500?. Hence Ireland is being run at a loss, which for the 

 moment is 1,312,500?. per annum, but which will increase. 



The ' contributed ' revenue, however, is really not known, and the estimated 

 adjustments, by which the Treasury calculate it, are certainly inaccurate. The 

 'collected' revenue is accurately known. It is 11,704,500?., at present 360,000/. 

 above expenditure. But the steady growth of expenditure will soon obliterate 

 this small margin. 



