M. Rouvier produced his Budget on Tuesday, and it proved
less sensational than was expected. He estimated the expenditure at the enormous figure of £144,000,000, and the deficit at rather more than E8,000,000. He proposes no grand cure for this difference, but snatches up windfalls like the gain on the conversion and the Chinese indemnity, suppresses the redemption fund of the national Savings Banks, and the annuity granted to the school funds, takes exemptions worth £1,000,000 a year from local brandy distillers, increases the price of best tobacco, and with a few other smaller " reforms " hopes altogether for a small surplus. The real work will have to be done in a future year, and will never be done successfully till private Members are forbidden, as in our own Parliament, to propose and carry new expenditure. The deficit is in the main due not to the Government, but to the Chamber.
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