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The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. / From the Accession of George III. to the Twenty-Third Year of the Reign of Queen Victoria cover

The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. / From the Accession of George III. to the Twenty-Third Year of the Reign of Queen Victoria

Chapter 809: MOTION ON AGRICULTURAL DISTRESS, ETC.
By Edward Farr
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The volume traces British political, parliamentary, and military developments from the accession of George III through the early nineteenth century, chronicling changes of ministry and cabinet, debates over colonial taxation and the American conflict, parliamentary controversies involving figures such as Wilkes and Warren Hastings, questions of Catholic relief and slave-trade abolition, and responses to the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars, including major naval and continental campaigns, the union with Ireland, and domestic legislation on finance, civil liberties, and parliamentary reform.

MOTION ON AGRICULTURAL DISTRESS, ETC.

Early in this session Mr. Brougham moved that it was the duty of the house to relieve agricultural distress by a reduction of taxes. This motion was made with a view of trying the strength of parties, as the small corps of Grenvillites, which had lately joined their ranks, could not support ministers, if the country members deserted them. Lord Londonderry met this covert attack on the ministers, however, by an assurance, that they intended to propose measures for that purpose, so that the arrow aimed at them fell pointless to the ground. The motion was negatived from this assurance, and his lordship soon after proposed the reappointment of the agricultural committee. On the report of this committee he submitted a plan of relief to the house; the principal heads of which were a repeal of the annual malt-duty, and a loan of £1,000,000 in exchequer-bills to the landed interest, on the security of warehoused corn. It was also enacted that when wheat should reach eighty shillings a quarter, a new scale of duties should be brought into permanent operation. At the same time the chancellor of the exchequer brought forward two financial operations. The first of these was a reduction of the navy five per cents., to stock carrying only four per cent; the holders having the option of being paid off at par, or of accepting the lower rate of interest with a small increase of capital as a bonus: the second was a plan to diminish the present charge for naval and military half-pay and civil pensions, known in financial jargon under the name of the dead-weight, by extending it in the form of annuities over a period of forty-five years, instead of allowing it to be gradually extinguished through the death of annuitants. This scheme appeared fallacious to many members, and unintelligible to others; but it was passed by the house, though subsequently the chancellor of the exchequer had to remodel his plan, as the great capitalists complained of its principles. The arrangement was completed in the following year by a bargain with the Bank of England.