MR. CHAMBERLAIN'S ESTIMATES.
ad THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR.")
Sin,—Mr. Chamberlain in his Birmingham speech put the Budget expenditure at nearly 2950,000,000, made up as follows:— Interest of Debt ... 2.320,000,000 War Pensions ... ... 123,000,000 Pre-war services (2200,000,000) at present values two and a-half times that amount 500;000,000 £943,000,000 In this estimate there is, however, an important error which ought not to have escaped the .attention of a Chancellor of the Exchequer. In the £200,000,000 pre-war Budget there is included a sum of £24,500,000 for the service of the debt, which at two and a-half times that amount accounts for £61,250,000 of the above £500,000,000. As Mr. Chamberlain allows separately for the debt it is plain that this sum of £61,250,000 should be deducted from the £943,000,000 and not reckoned twice over. Such deduction brings the total down to £881,750,000, so that if all unnecessary or premature expenditure be avoided, and a rigid economy be enforced, a Budget of about £850,000,000 is
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