IMPERIAL POLITICS.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2641, 25 October 1909, Page 5

IMPERIAL POLITICS.

THE DEVELOPMENT BILL. "United Punas Copyright. LONDON, Oct. 22. The House of Lords passed the. Development Bill through committee. The amendments made secure Parlia,rnentary control of tho bureaucracy, and delete an all-embracing phrase allowing money to be spent for any economic development. IRISH OPPOSE T. P. O’CONNOR. (Received October 24, 5.5 p.m.) LONDON, October 24. The Sinn Fein organisation is opposing Mr. T. P. O’Connor’s mission to America to raise funds for the Irish Parliamentary party, on the grounds that it means the subsidising of a, party which is in pawn in purely English politics. EAST MARYLEBONE ELECTION. The East Marylebone Unionists and Conservatives, despite the executive’s decision and Mr. Joseph Chamberlain’s letter suggesting that Lord Robert Cecil be unopposed, have adopted Mr. Richard Jebb as tariff reform candidate. IMPRESSIVE STATEMENT BY EARL OF PEMBROKE. At a Budget protest meeting at Salisbury, the Earl of Pembroke declared that he had never made a penny profit out of his 40,000 acres of estate in Wiltshire. Had he had the value of the estate in consols he. would have been a rich man. He added that the Government singled out landlords for special taxation because they opposed Liberal politics. THE REVISED BUDGET STATEMENT. Mr. Lloyd-George made his revised Budget statement in the House of Commons. He announced concessions on the income tax to cost £300,000, and on licenses of £500,000 sterling. The decrease on the spirit duty was £BOO,OOO. The extra cost of land valuation was £200,000. Local authorities’ share of the increment land tax would be £300,000. Death duties gave an increased yield of £1,300,000, stamps £250,000, the post office of £200,000, and land taxes of £IOO,OOO. There would be-a. net deficit of a quar--' ter of a million, which: would be met by taking, a futrber half-million, from the sinking fund. Mr. Lloyd-George attributed the increase in stamps to the boom on the Stock Exchange. He declared that all the taxes were doing well, except that on whisky, which in some districts had decreased 30 per cent. The distillers had greatly reduced their reserve stocks owing to tho uncertainty of the Budget prospects. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN CRITICISES THE REVISED BUDGET. Mr. Austen Chamberlain said that the diminution of whisky duties proved that the Chancellor (Mr. Lloyd-George) was too greedy. He asked whether the supplementary estimates included the money for the Dreadnoughts. He denied that there -was a boom on the Stock Exchange.