LORD HEWART ' S VIEWS.
I have made this brief reference to Mr. Snowden's remarks merely by way of emphasizing what seems to me to be the great peril of the moment, namely, the determin- ation of politicians, of whatever party, to take from rather than to relieve the tax-payer. Nevertheless, I do not waver in my opinion not only that there will be no return to national prosperity until there is economy in the national expenditure, but that if the present extrava- gance continues we shall find both our economic and social problems becoming even more acute. It is with the greater pleasure, therefore, that one welcomes such outspoken ; utterances as those of the Lord Chief Justice of England, who, when addressing the Manchester Reform Club, ; recently declaimed against the extravagance in the public expenditure. 'Lord Hewart, after disclaiming any • intention of dealing with the matter in a party spirit, said :-- "And is retrenchment any longer a party question ? True it is that men praise economy in general while they resist every proposal for economy in particular. But can anybody apply the rare but refreshing process of thought to the disgusting subject of taxation without being appalled at the annual balance-sheet ? If you look at the statistical abstract, or, more boldly still, at the back of your demand-note for supertax, you find that the annual expenditure exceeds £820,000,000 sterling. Most of us are old enough to remember the vehement and unaffected indignation of Gladstone when for the first time a Budget reached £100,000,000. But to-day—I leave out the odd coppers, which are the enemy of all clear-thinking in finance—the service of the debt costs you annually £400,000,000, the armed forces of the Crown cost £120,000,000, and the Civil Services cost 040,000,000. Is there no Hume or Cobden, is there no Bright or Gladstone, to grapple with figures like these ? And you may depend upon it that if you have super- Bumf:: or swollen departments, the evils which they involve will not be limited to waste of money. Is there not an old verse which . runs in some such way as this :— -
For Statutes find some mischief still For bureaucrats to do' ?
Will nobody ascertain, with exact precision, what departments there are ; how and why and under what' authority each of them came into existence ; whether, as to each of them, its purpose remains or has been fulfilled or abandoned ; what is the size of its staff as compared with the last year before the War ; and how, for example, the salary and bonus of each of the twenty exceedingly able gentlemen at the head of the department contrast and compare with his pre-War emoluments ? Assuredly, retrenchment is not a party question."
This is not the first time that Lord Hewart has per- formed a good service by speaking boldly on matters vitally affecting the national interests, and it would be well if some of our leading statesmen would pluck up their courage and deal, before it is too late, with this profligacy in our national expenditure. ARTHUR W. KIDDY.
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