I move Section 2. It provides that when a provisional arrangement is made it may be confirmed.
DAIL IN COMMITTEE. - DOUBLE TAXATION (RELIEF) BILL, 1923.—COMMITTEE.
The Dáil went into Committee on the Double Taxation (Relief) Bill, 1923.
SECTION 1.
Wherever under any law from time to time in force in Great Britain or in Northern Ireland any tax is for the time being payable in respect of a subject of charge in respect of which a corresponding tax is payable in Soarstát Eireann it shall be lawful for the Executive Council of Saorstát Eireann to enter into a provisional arrangement with the British Government and if the case shall so require with the consent of the Government of Northern Ireland for the granting of relief in cases where there is a charge both to the Irish Free State tax and to the British tax in respect of the same subject matter.
The Section was agreed to.
SECTION 2.
It shall be lawful for the Governor-General of the Irish Free State by order made on the advice of the Executive Council to confirm any such provisional arrangement as is mentioned in the foregoing section, and thereupon such provisional arrangement shall, as from the date of such order, or any later date specified in such order, but subject to the provisions of this Act, have effect as if enacted in this Act.
I move as an amendment to add before Section 2 the following new section:
"(1) If in the Irish Free State the rate of Income Tax or Super-tax is not greater than one half of the rate in Great Britain or Northern Ireland, as the case may be, no relief may be granted in accordance with any provisional arrangement entered into in virtue of Section 1 of this Act.
"(2) If in the Irish Free State the rate of Income Tax or Super-tax is greater than one-half of the rate in Great Britain or Northern Ireland, as the case may be, the maximum relief which may be, granted in accordance with any provisional arrangement entered into in virtue of Section 1 of this Act shall be—
"(a) If the rate in the Irish Free State is greater than the rate in Great Britain or Northern Ireland, as the case may be, one-half of the last-mentioned rate;
"(b) If the rate in the Irish Free State is not greater than the rate in Great Britain or Northern Ireland, as the case may be, the difference between one-half of the last-mentioned rate and the rate in the Irish Free State.”
The new section which I have moved is taken almost word for word, with such alterations as are necessary, from the Act which is in force in Australia respecting assessments for Income Tax. The purpose of the amendment is to lay down, as from the Oireachtas, the kind of arrangement that may be made in respect of Income Tax. The proposal of the Minister is that two Ministries should come to an arrangement, make an Order, act upon that Order, make remissions under that Order, and then allow the Dáil to annul that Order if they do not like it. Now, that is not the kind of legislation that we should set our seal to. Surely, when we come to deal with taxation, at the first opportunity the Oireachtas has to deal with taxation, we should not say that we hand over our power to tax to the Finance Minister, leaving to ourselves only the right to say, when the damage has been done, that it shall not be done. When we are asked to pass legislation giving relief to citizens of Saorstát who have investments in other countries the Dáil ought to lay down clearly the lines upon which that relief is to be given. The Bill, as it stands, does not lay down any such lines; it leaves that entirely to the Minister to make arrangements with the Minister of another country, and then to come and ask us to consent, or rather to approve, of acts which have been committed, and of Orders which have been made, and which cannot be retrieved in practice. The Australian Act dealing with a similar case giving relief to Australian citizens who have investments in England lays it down that there shall be a certain proportionate relief, according to the rates of income tax payable in Australia and the rates of income tax payable in Great Britain. The Legislature there laid down the lines upon which the Ministry might proceed. We are asked to give the Ministry a free hand. I think that is more than the Ministry ought to ask the Dáil to do. The effect of the amendment, which, as I say, is practically identical with the Act at present and for some time past in operation in Australia, would be not to relieve entirely the income taxpayer leaving Ireland from more than the highest rate which may be levied in either of the countries, but to remit a portion of the other taxation. For instance, if the Irish rate of tax were 6s., and the British rate 4s., this would come in under sub-clause (a) of 2 in my amendment. The relief granted by the Irish Government would be one-half of the British rate, that is 2s. Assume that the British Government calculates the relief it grants in the same way, the British relief would be the difference between one-half of the Irish rate and the British rate; that is between 3s. and 4s., leaving 1s. of relief. The total relief, therefore, to the individual taxpayer, from both Governments, would be 3s., that is 2s. plus 1s., and the total rate paid by the taxpayer would be 7s. instead of 10s. So that the Irish taxpayer under that particular example, that is supposing the Irish rate was 6s. and the British rate only 4s., would be paying 7s. of the total. That is to say he would be penalised to the extent of 1s. because he preferred to invest his money in England. That is an example supposing, which I hope will not be the fact, that the Irish rate of income tax is 6s. and the British rate 4s. But let us take paragraph (b) of sub-section 2, and suppose that the Irish rate is 4s. and the British rate 6s., see what will be the effect of the amendment. The relief granted by the Irish Government would be the difference between one-half the British rate and the total Irish rate, that is 1s. Assume, as I suppose we have a right to assume, that the British Government would calculate its relief in the same way, the British relief would be one-half of the Irish rate, that is 2s. The total relief, therefore, to the taxpayer from both Governments would be 3s., that is 1s. from the Irish, and 2s. from the English and the total rate paid by the taxpayer again would be 7s. instead of 10s., supposing there were no relief granted at all.
It will be seen then that in both cases the rate of tax paid by the taxpayer in the aggregate, while it is less than the sum of the two rates separately, is rather greater than the higher of the separate rates, and to that extent this proposal operates to discourage the taxpayer from investing outside his own country. The example is taken, as I have said, from an Act at present in operation, and in operation for some time back in Australia. I submit that it is in accord with what the Irish people desire that we should utilise the fiscal powers we now have to encourage the investment of Irish money in Irish concerns and Irish loans. The Minister has brought forward a Bill and he has told us that the object is to arrange with the British Government for relief from double taxation. My amendment would also give relief from double taxation. But he also wants to give statutory effect to arrangements by which a tax should not be paid in the Free State after it had been paid on the same subject in England. I think that it would be well if we had our minds clear as to what we mean when we speak of taxation on the same subject. "The same subject of charge" is a phrase in the Bill. An Irish citizen has investments in the London and North Western Railway, or whatever the new name may be of that company. The company pays Income Tax, at the source, to England. But the shareholder who lives in Ireland is supposed to have been taxed because the Company has been taxed, and presumably he is to get relief because the "subject of charge," the income of the North Western Railway Coy. has already been taxed. I want to make the point clear that it is the individual Irish income, it is the individual that lives in Ireland; it is his income that we are concerned with, not the income of the London and North Western Railway Coy., not the income of the Electrical Supply Company. "The subject of charge" is not in reality the thing to which the tax is attached, but the person and the thing. The Tea, the Coffee, the Sugar, the Land, are only the means that the State uses to get at the income of the individual. But it is the individual that is being taxed. I contend, when we are dealing with investments in public companies, those companies operating in England, we ought not to think of the Irish shareholders in that Company having been taxed by the Irish Government for Irish services rendered to that individual citizen of Ireland because the Company in which he has his investments has paid taxation to the British Government on its profits. And we ought not to give, as a matter of course, relief in such circumstances. But I am, in this amendment, meeting the case made by the Minister in introducing the Bill for which he received a Second Reading. I am accepting the principle; I am working upon the principle that relief has to be granted and I am contending that it is the business of the Dáil to decide what kind of relief is to be granted, and the principles upon which that relief is to be granted. It is not the business of the Minister, and I do not think it would be asking too much for the Oireachtas to follow the plan that has been in operation as between England and Australia and to give relief on the same principles as the Australian Government gives relief to its citizens who have investments in England. Now, I presume, though I do not know, that the British Government gives relief to British citizens having investments in Australia reciprocally according to the same plan as the Australian Government does to its citizens. All we are asking in this amendment is that we shall at least adopt the plan that the Australian Government has seen wise to adopt, to encourage Australian investments in Australian concerns. We should also encourage Irish investments in Irish concerns, and not simply assume that we are still in fiscal union with Great Britain. The Minister told us that he had consulted Stock-brokers in regard to one effect of this Bill. And they were all in favour of accommodation in relation to stamp duties and I suppose also in relation to this income tax proposition. Of course they are in favour of it. If the Minister would bring in a Bill to annul the Treaty, the Stockbrokers would be in favour of it. They do not want fiscal independence. They do not want financial independence. They do not want to encourage Irish Company promoting apart from English Company promoting. They want to have a constant traffic in finance between England and Ireland. The more selling and buying of English shares on the Irish Stock Exchange the better for them. The Minister quotes the words of the Dublin Stockbrokers to support him in the contention that this relief should be given to Irish investors in British Companies. It is not the kind of argument that ought to weigh with the Dáil. I am asking the Dáil to agree to insert this new Section because I want to insist that the Dáil must retain power over the Minister in respect to the imposition of taxation and in respect to the relief of taxation. And in the Bill the Dáil is, for practical purposes, foregoing that power. I am asking that in respect of Income Tax that we should lay down the lines and the limits beyond which relief may not be given. In the second place, I am asking that the relief that is to be given upon these lines will be given with the object of making it more profitable for investors to leave their money in Irish securities than to take their money over to England.
Might I take this opportunity of protesting against a system that allows very important amendments like this being placed in our hands practically ten minutes or a quarter of an hour before the sitting? I hold an amendment of this importance is a thing that we ought to have at least three or four days to consider. There are outside bodies who also should know something about these amendments before we are called upon to make up our minds. I refer to the Chambers of Commerce, the Mercantile Associations, and other important bodies of business people, and I think something ought to be done to prevent, in the future, important amendments like this being sprung on us at five minutes' notice.
I quite agree with the Deputy that neither Bills nor motions nor amendments should be sent in without due notice, but the President was anxious to take this Bill to-day, and he agreed that he would consider amendments up to the last moment. If a Bill has to be considered on short notice, Deputies must have the right to bring in amendments on equally short or even shorter notice.
I am very glad that Deputy Byrne has mentioned the matter he did. I was present in the Dáil when it was decided to take this Bill to-day, and, having decided to take it on very short notice, it was inevitable that amendments should have to be put forward at the last moment. I have listened with great care to the exposition that Deputy Johnson has given of the amendment he is moving, and, if I may, I would like to pay tribute to the clarity and lucidity and care with which he expounded its purpose, enabling everybody in the Dáil to follow exactly the working of the amendment he proposed. I am impressed with the amendment, and it is perfectly clear that if another sister State of this Commonwealth has found it necessary, in order to encourage native industries, to adopt procedure of this kind, that procedure comes before us with a very strong primâ facie case. One cannot say more, because it is impossible, in a matter of ten minutes or a quarter of an hour, without turning up the question more closely, to be able to speak upon it. I am not now rising merely to support the amendment or to speak against it, but seeing that an amendment of such a critical nature has been moved at the very outset of our fiscal career, it seems to me that the right course to adopt now would be to postpone the Committee Stage of this Bill, and permit the members of the Dáil to look into this matter further before the Bill comes before the Dáil at a later stage. It is impossible to do justice to this amendment at so short a notice. The very fact that Deputy Johnson has had to spend a considerable amount of time and devote considerable care in preparing what he had to say, and in considering the matter in order to place before us, as fully as he has done, his view, is in itself an argument why we should have time to consider it further. I do urge that the Committee Stage of this Bill should be postponed in order that the Dáil may have an opportunity of looking into the precise bearing of this amendment—not merely to look into it for themselves, but also to do what I judge is of even greater importance—do what Deputy Byrne has just referred to. We are here as Deputies. It is our business to endeavour to express in this Dáil, so far as we may, and as carefully as we may, the views of those who charge us with their interests. Here is a matter on which a number of us would like to consult with some of our constituents who are concerned, and I think time ought to be given both to the deliberation the amendment requires, and also to the consultation as to what its bearings might be.
I think, Sir, it would not be incorrect to say that the honourable Deputy who has just spoken has in a very nice, a very gentlemanly, and a very cultured manner informed us that he does not know a single thing about this matter, and he has had to pay a tribute to Deputy Johnson, who made a study of it. It was open to the Deputy to make the same study of it that Deputy Johnson did, and if he had done so, instead of studying the shortcomings and the imperfections of the Government, I think his time would have been better occupied. The amendment is in effect what is the practice in Australia, and the difference between Ireland and Australia is a very large difference. In the first place the British Government made this arrangement off its own bat Australia then made a reciprocal arrangement, and this is the reciprocal arrangement here. My interpretation of it and my deduction of its meaning is not the same as Deputy Johnson's. I understand all through that the effect of double income tax—the actual effect of it upon the person here assessed—was that he had not to pay more than the higher rate of tax which operated in either of the two countries. While not admitting the case the Deputy has made out against foreign investments, I do say that it is to our interest to look after, in a certain measure, those who have foreign investments. If you are to take the money market as an indication of the value or the importance of foreign investments to any country I think it will be admitted that of all the nations the one which is in the soundest financial position at the present moment is the one that has perhaps the greatest number of foreign investments and the greatest revenue coming into its coffers, year after year, from those foreign investments, and I think in matters of that kind, as in matters of taxation, it is unwise to jump to conclusions or to accept too hastily the many these that have been put forward in those papers. Those things are very useful in certain political circumstances. I think you know we have exaggerated slightly with regard to them, and I think it would be highly dangerous to accept on their face value all those things now and to act accordingly. The amendment, as I have stated, applies to provisions of the Finance Act of 1920 in the reciprocal sense, and the bases of our arrangements are practically the same.
State it in your Bill.
There are other things to be thought of and other things to be considered besides those things, and I am sure that Deputy Johnson does not want me to explain them. They are at present the subject of very serious consideration and they are of very great importance to this country. I think one particular body alone is affected to the extent of a million pounds per annum as the result of it. This arrangement that we are coming to is not yet complete. The only difference there is between Great Britain and Australia is that the Australian rate is an effective rate. I am sure the Deputy will understand that, even though some of his very cultured brethren in the assembly may not quite appreciate it. It means the income tax a man would have to pay is divided by his income to get the effective rate, and that is a very different thing. The arrangement we propose is that the Irish rate for the purposes of relief is the ordinary rate and not the effective rate. The fault of the effective arrangement is that the person bears higher than a higher rate. His relief is measured not by the higher rate, but by the effective rate. This particular arrangement is cast-iron; there is no flexibility in it. We will be committed to it right off. It is not in the interest of the persons affected or of the country that we should be bound by an arrangement which possibly may be improved. Therefore we cannot see that there is any case for accepting the amendment and I would ask the Dáil to reject it.
The Income Tax Act, like the Finance Act, will be an annual Act and there is no cast-iron nature about it at all, and if my interpretation of the Australian Act is faulty, and if the principles of the Australian Act in respect of income tax are the intentions of the Ministry, then that is a very strong argument indeed for placing that in the Bill. If the intentions of the Ministry are to ensure that Irish citizens shall be placed in the same position as Australian citizens in respect of income tax, then quite apart from my interpretation of the effect of the Australian Act that is a good case for placing the Australian provisions into our Bill, and they will only apply to one year. You can make new provisions in the next financial Act next year. There is nothing cast-iron about a Finance Act. So far as the suggestion that I have been overwrought by reading theses upon this problem, I can tell the Minister that I have read the clauses of the Income Tax Assessment Act, 1921, and I tried to work them out in practical operation. These are the only treatises, these, tomes or encyclopædias that I have read, because I have not had time since the Minister brought in the Bill. We were here from three o'clock yesterday and we had business for two hours in the Committee room earlier in the day. We have not had time since Tuesday night, and if the Minister would give us longer time perhaps, we would satisfy Deputy Byrne and convince the Dáil by spun-out orations, but we have not had time. You are giving us too much to do and we have not had time.
There were no orations from Deputy Byrne since he came into this Dáil.
Amendment put.
Dáil divided:—Tá, 11; Níl, 25.
Tá
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Tomás de Nógla.Riobárd O Deaghaidh.Tomás Mac Eoin.Liam Ó Briain.Tomás O Conaill.Aodh Ó Cúlacháin. |
Séamus Eabhróid.Seán Ó Laidhin.Seán Buitléir.Domhnall Ó Muirgheasa.Domhnall Ó Ceallacháin. |
Níl
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Liam T. Mac Cosgair.Seán O Maolruaidh.Seán Ó Duinnín.Domhnall O Mocháin.Pádraig Mag Ualghairg.Darghal Figes.Ailfrid O Broin.Domhnall Mac Cárthaigh.Sir Séamus Craig, Ridire, M.D.Liam Thrift.Pádraic Ó Máille.Seosamh Ó Faoileacháin.Seoirse Mac Niocaill. |
Fionán Ó Loingsigh.Séamus Ó Cruadhlaoich.Criostóir Ó Broin.Caoimhghin O hUigín.Próinsias Bulfin.Séamus O Dóláin.Próinsias Mag Aonghusa.Eamon O Dúgáin.Peadar Ó hAodha.Liam Mac Sioghaird.Tomás O Domhnaill.Uinseann de Faoite. |
Amendment declared lost.
I beg to move the following amendment:—
"Before Section 2 to insert the following new Section:—`Every provisional arrangement entered into by the Executive Council of Saorstát Eireann under this Act shall forthwith be laid before Dáil Eireann, and if Dáil Eireann shall, within twenty-one days on which it has sat next after such provisional arrangement was laid before it, pass a resolution requiring the revocation or amendment of such provisional arrangement, such provisional arrangement shall be revoked or amended accordingly.' "
The Bill, as introduced, would only give the right to the Dáil, in Section 4, to discuss the Order after it had been made. This amendment proposes that after the provisional arrangement has been suggested or proposed the Dáil would then have an opportunity of discussing the matter before it had been made an Order, and I accordingly move this amendment.
I want to repeat what has already been said in connection with other matters of this kind—that we ought to have an opportunity, in important matters affecting the people, to see and revoke or alter any Order proposed to be made before it is made. Mere Departmental affairs might be satisfactorily dealt with in the way it is proposed, but important matters, which are really legislative matters, ought not to be made by a Department and have the force of law, and only be altered by a complete annulment after they have come into operation and after their effects have begun to work. An Order has to be made under the Bill, and anything done under the authority of that Order is to be valid until the Dáil revokes it or annuls it, and it cannot amend it, and we are being brought into the habit, because it is becoming a habit, of allowing legislation to be enacted by this method. This amendment will provide for the provisional arrangement that may be made between the two countries to lie upon the Table for consideration by the Dáil and amendment by the Dáil before it has the effect of law. And that is a reasonable suggestion to make to any Parliament. Otherwise this legislature is simply becoming either a ratifying body, or, if not willing to ratify, it must cancel and annul the proposals of the Departments. We ought not to encourage that procedure in regard to legislation. We are either a legislature or we are a public meeting. If we are to be a legislature, we ought to retain control over these matters of taxation, and I therefore submit my amendment because it has that object and intention.
I presume that while we could retain our character as a legislature, it is open to us to adopt certain methods which are necessary in certain circumstances, I expect we do not claim the right to legislate for the British Parliament. If we find that it is necessary for the Executive to enter into certain arrangements to which other persons are parties, as much as we are, it is not open to us, as one of the confirming bodies, in a case of this sort, to alter, amend, revoke or change or do anything we wish with regard to any such agreement. This Dáil can certainly annul it, if it so desires, but we will never reach an end of any such arrangement if it is open to be amended by either party, or if it has to meet the particular wishes or desire or needs or requirements of either of the parties to such an arrangement.
This is an enabling Act, that particular point seems to have been lost sight of in some of the amendments. If it was not an enabling Act it might partake of the character that the Deputy claims it should, and lay down, specify and regulate, and so on, but that is not the character of it, and we certainly did not give it that character when introducing it. These are matters that must be the subject of negotiation, and if the subject of negotiation I do not think certainly that the character of this House is interfered with if the subject of these negotiations are laid before it, and if it has authority either to reject or accept it.
Amendment put, and negatived.
This decision affects the amendment to Section 4 as well.
Question :—"That Section 2 stand part of the Bill," put and agreed to.
SECTIONS 3, 4, and 5.
3.—An order made by the Governor-General of the Irish Free State under this Act shall only have effect by virtue of this Act if and so long as the arrangement confirmed by such order, in so far as it relates to the relief to be granted from the British Tax, has the effect of law in Great Britain or in Northern Ireland as the case may be.
4.—Every Order made by the Governor-General of the Irish Free State under this Act shall forthwith be laid before Dáil Eireann, and if Dáil Eireann shall within 21 days on which it has sat next after such order was laid before it pass a resolution requiring the revocation of such order, such order shall be revoked and annulled accordingly, but without prejudice to the validity of anything previously done under such order.
5.—The obligation as to secrecy imposed by any enactment with regard to a tax to which an order made by the Governor-General of the Irish Free State under this Act relates shall not prevent the disclosure to any authorised officer of the British Government of such facts as may be necessary to enable relief to be duly given in accordance with the arrangements confirmed by such order.
Sections 3, 4 and 5 were agreed to and added to the Bill.
SECTION 6.
I move Section 6:—"That this Act may be cited as Double Taxation (Relief) Act, 1923.
I beg to move as an amendment before Section 6 to insert the following new Section:—
"If Dáil Eireann shall at any time pass a resolution applying this Act to the making of a provisional agreement with any Government other than the British Government or the Government of Northern Ireland, then this Act shall apply as if, for every reference in the preceding sections to those Governments and to Great Britain and Northern Ireland, there were substituted a reference to the Government or territory, as the case may require, to which the resolution aforesaid relates."
I gave notice of this amendment, the effect of which is, if the Dáil passes a resolution, to allow the provisions of this Act to be made applicable to any other country, beside Great Britain or the north-east corner of Ireland, and to empower the Ministry here to make similar arrangements with the Governments of any other country. Apart from the numbers and the amounts the principle is the same, and if it is desirable to relieve the citizens of Saorstát Eireann from double taxation in respect of investments in England, it is equally desirable to relieve these same citizens if they have investments in Canada, Australia, United States and France, provided that reciprocal arrangements can be agreed upon between the countries. There should be no objection in principle, at any rate, to this amendment. A secondary effect of its embodiment in this Bill would be to leave a hint, at any rate, before the people that there is power to make arrangements of this financial kind with other countries besides England. I do not imagine that the Minister will object to the amendment as a matter of principle, and as there are citizens of Saorstát Eireann who have investments in America, Canada, Australia, South Africa, and as they want to be placed upon an equality with other citizens who have investments only in England, I would expect the Minister will accept the amendment, and I would point out for his reassurance that it cannot come into effect until the Dáil has passed a resolution applying the Act, and a resolution empowering Ministers to make arrangements of a similar kind with other countries.
I was at first in clined to reject any consideration of this motion at all. That would be speaking as Minister for Finance. It was not our intention to offect our revenues by this Double Taxation Relief Bill. The people affected by this would not have been affected if it had not been for the setting up of Saorstát Eireann. Now, this amendment brings in another order—an order of people, if there are any, who have borne this tax up to this, and in respect of whom, if we were to make such concession as this, we would have to part with some of our revenue. That is not the case in connection with the class or order we had in mind when dealing with the Double Taxation Bill.
In other words a certain financial unit was divided, and, being divided, certain persons having investments in both places, or investments in one and residence in the other, became liable to double duty. Now by reason of the setting up of the Saorstát any such complication or any such addition to the ordinary taxation that they would have to bear has been borne by people who have investments in the United States, France, Germany or any other country. They are still in the same position as they were in before the setting up, or before the division or the institution of a separate revenue for this country, so that anything of this sort is a disadvantage to us, because it is a decrease in our revenue, and so on. As the question of principle has been raised I will be prepared to consider the matter on the Report Stage to see if it could be so arranged as to indicate a likelihood of relief from double taxation in the event of an arrangement or a resolution being proposed or passed by the Minister for Finance. I am not disposed presently to approve of it if it is going to mean a loss of revenue.
Apart from the question whether or not it would be in order to do anything on the Report Stage I would ask the Minister to reflect on the case of residents or citizens of Saorstát who have investments in Canada, or shall I say in Australia. Hitherto, because of the Fiscal Union the fact that the British Finance Act applied to residents and citizens of Saorstát they were exempt from double taxation. In the case of Australia, henceforward they will not be exempt, unless you accept some amendment of this kind to which the Minister dissents.
We have taken over that particular Finance Act which gives that relief.
We are in a pleasant place now. In respect to Australia then we have fixed the terms and the lines on which relief will be given by law; we know it; we are presumed to know it, because we have taken over an Act which fixes the lines upon which relief is to be given. But in respect of investors in England, we are not allowed to know —we do not know. So that the investors in English securities are at a disadvantage in comparison with the investors in Australian securities. The investors in English securities do not know, at this moment, how they will be fixed in regard to income tax because that is all wrapped up in the mind of the Finance Minister; but, in respect of the Australian investors, they know because the law has already been passed in England, and adopted by the Saorstát, so that they are in a privileged position. I think we would be well advised to extend the power of making arrangements, by resolution of the Dáil, with other countries besides the British Dominions. If the Minister does not make such arrangements, he is not going to lose any money, and it is in his power to say whether such arrangements shall be made; at least, it should be indicated under this Act that we are prepared to consider financial arrangements with other countries besides England and the British Dominions.
Amendment put, and negatived.
Question put: "That Section 6 stand part of the Bill."
Agreed.