Speech By The Minister For Finance And Planning

Author : George Eulas Foster
Publisher : Forgotten Books
ISBN 13 : 9780260515179
Total Pages : 26 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (151 download)

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Download or read book Budget Speech Delivered by Hon. George E. Foster, D. C. L. , M. P. , Minister of Finance in the House of Commons written by George Eulas Foster and published by Forgotten Books. This book was released on 2017-11-07 with total page 26 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Excerpt from Budget Speech Delivered by Hon. George E. Foster, D. C. L., M. P., Minister of Finance in the House of Commons: Friday, 3rd May, 1895 And with these excuses, and these plati tudes, he marched on to the doleful tune of a two million deficit, a twenty-seven million drop in trade, a three-quarter of a million increase in expenditure, and an eight and a half million addition to the debt. In February, 1877, he came to the front again, and declared that the year 1875-76 was one of an exceedingly critical character, which would be long re membered in our financial history. Well it might be. Trade was diminishing, and went on to diminish. Revenue was de creasing, and gave no hepe or anticipation of rising again. The only things that were rising were the taxes and the debt, and they were rising with dizzy rapidity. Still, the Finance Minister at that time was hope ful. He pitched his song to a cheerful key, and said there was good reason for sup posing that we had seen probably the last of the depression. He marshalled the facts of increased circulation, deposits in the savings banks, life insurance growth, exports, and the consumption of sugar and tea, as being reasons why the country was not in so bad a condition after all. He then praised his loan, bearing four per cent interest, issued at ninety-one and costing per cent, laid on further taxation of about half a million dollars, ventured the predic tion that the ship of state was weathering the storm, and drawing moderately close to clear water, and proceeded to bask in the after-glow of past deficits, and to warm himself by anticipation in the coming efful gence of the one and a half million deficit that was dawning upon him. In 1878 he opened with a financial jeremiad such as had never before been, and never again will, I hope, he indulged in by a Finance Minister. It is nearly four years since, as Minister of Finance, it became my unpleasant duty to point out to the House the grave financial difficulties which beset our position, and the necessity of submitting to considerably increased taxation if desired to provide for the liabilities we had ih curred. Unhappily, grave as were the forebod ings I then expressed the depression which ao tually took place surpassed the extent of that upon which I had calculated. It is not often in the commercial history of any country that we are called upon to chronicle so great a reduction not merely in the total volume of our trade, but also in the revenue derived therefrom, as we have seen within the last two or three years. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.