NEWS OF THE WEEK.
IR ROBERT HORNE introduced his Budget on Monday. 10 It delivered certain goods which were long overdue, but the Government can be given no credit for doing what was at once belated and inevitable. The movement is in the right direction. Remission of taxation will be required again and again by the over-burdened nation as the years pass. But this cannot possibly be granted without much stricter economy. The agreeable truth is that the present financial policy entails economy. Sir Robert Home reminded the House that the past year had been full of unexampled trial and difficulty, owing to the calamitous miners' strike and to the sudden depression of trade. These facts accounted largely for the great. Supplementary Esti- mates. The country had surmounted the crisis with less misfor- tune than he had anticipated. Last year he had esti- mated for a revenue of £1,216,000,000 and an expenditure of £1,136,000,000, leaving a surplus of £80,000,000 for the reduction of the Debt. The actual revenue was £1,124,880,000, or £91,000,000 less than he expected ; the expenditure was £1,079,187,000, or £57,000,000 below the estimate. There remained a surplus of £45,693,000 for the repayment of Debt.
