It is said that the Government are half inclined to
give way about the Coal-duty on Loudon. The majority of the Metropolitan Members will vote for continuing it, if only it is spent fairly, so as to include the suburbs, and if it is distinctly provided that a representative body shall ultimately remit or impose the tax. We doubt the wisdom of the decision, not only because coal is an article of prime necessity, but because we dislike the idea of letting individual cities settle the form of their own taxation. If the cities are to establish octrois, let Parliament so enact ; but it cannot allow a hundred taxing bodies to adopt different systems Perhaps the remission of the tax had better wait till the whole question of rating is reconsidered, as it must be shortly ; but let us avoid setting up an elastic and most dangerous precedent. We may have a workman vote for taxing the ingress of all goods—furniture, for instance—which London herself produces.
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