EXPENDITURE BY GREAT BRITAIN ON THE AUSTRALLIN COLONIES.
The Mother-country does not appear to spend any money on Victoria : the last Parliamentary return on Colonial Expenditure does not mention that colony. The following table exhibits the amounts expended on four colonies in the year 1853-'4, and the purposes to which they were applied.
Military Civil Naval Charges. Charges. Charges. Total.
South Australia £10,248 .... 2 .... - £10,250 New South Wales 61,193 10,036 .... £83 71,313 Van Diemen's Land.. 55,110 .... 209,176 .... - 264,287 West Australia 35,711 98,123 -- 133,835 162,262 317,337 83 479,685
These totals do not really represent 479,685/. spent by Great Bri- tain on her Australian Colonies : except South Australia, all are "penal settlements," or have been, and the large expenditure has mostly been in- curred in guarding, disciplining, feeding, and clothing convicts. In fact, the Australian Colonies cost us next to nothing. Under the new constitu- tion for the four free Colonies-Western Australia has become a convict settlement by her own choice, and has the advantage of a large expendi- ture in consequence-the following sums have been reserved out of the re- venue annually for the purposes indicated. The Civil List includes the Governor's salary, judicial salaries, and those of heads of departments. The retiring allowances are for officials liable to removal on political grounds.
Victoria New South Wales
Van Diemen's Land
South Australia
Civil List. Retiring Allowances. Public Worship.
£49,500 .... £4,000 .... £50,000 20,550 .... 5,900 .... 28,000
13,300 .... 2,175 .... 15,000
16,000 .... 1,766 .... - 99,350 13,841 93,000
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