OCR Text |
Show GREAT BRITAIN BEARS BURDEN OFTHEENTENTE Average Daily Expenditure of the Government More Than $23,000,000, According Ac-cording to Bonar Law. NATIONAL DEBT IS MOUNTING HIGHER In Asking for New Vote of Credit, Chancellor Gives Some Important Facts and Figures. LONDON, Feb. 12, 5:10 p. m. The average daily expenditure of Great Britain Brit-ain is now 5,700,000, Andrew Bonar Law, chancellor of the exchequer, announced an-nounced In the house of commons today. to-day. The chancellor said the expenditure since the beginning of the war was 4,-200,000,000. 4,-200,000,000. At the end of the current year the national na-tional debt would stand between 3,800,-000,000 3,800,-000,000 and 3,900,000,000. Advances to allies and dominions -would be approximately approxi-mately 390,000,000. The number of applications and the amount applied for by the general public for the new loan, the chancellor said, ! were larger than ever before. The chancellor pointed out that the total votes of credit for the current financial finan-cial year would amount to 1,950,000,-000. 1,950,000,-000. He said that was In excess of the estimate of Reginald McKenna, chancellor chan-cellor of the exchequer under the As-qulth As-qulth government, and that the increase was due to additional expenditures for munitions and advances to the allies and dominions. The average expenditure had increased by 1,000,000 daily, as compared com-pared with the first sixty-three days of the financial year. There also had been an increase in expenditures for the army, but it was proportionate with the Increase In-crease In the number of troops, the army being fourteen times as large as when the war began. Will Last Until June. The amounts asked for, Mr. Law said, would enable the government to meet expenses ex-penses until the end of May. Of the last vote of credit there had been an unexpected unex-pected balance of 76,000,000. "We have a superiority not only in men, but in equipment." said Mr. Law. He asserted that the increase in the production pro-duction of munitions' was going on all the time, being as marked now as at any previous period. The smallest increase in any kind of shell, as compared with the average of the first year of the war, was twenty-eight times that output. In making advances to her allies, the chancellor continued. Great Britain considered con-sidered one thing only whether it would he in the general interest. He emphasized the importance of co-ordination in every field and said the conference at Home ' h;ui resulted in a decision in regard to the policy to be adopted toward Greece, , w hich policy was now being followed. ; Danger Much Less. The object of that policy, said the chancellor, was to prevent the entente forces from being attacked from the rear in the event of a German-Bulgarian invasion. in-vasion. The entente commanders, he added, now are satisfied that the danger i rotn that quarter is much less than it was a few weeks ago. .Mr. McKenna said that never before had such a large credit been asked at the beginning of a session and that the government must either be intending to prevent parliament from reviewing the expenditures during the coming month or else the money thus provided should tide the country over a possible parliamentary recess or election. Mr. Iaw said the question of a general election had never entered las mind. Confidence in Future. In giving the progressive increases in the daily expenditure for the periods of the war corresponding with the five votes of credit, Mr. Bonar Law said the daily expenditure the last sixty-three days was 5.730.000. This increase, he said, was not due to recent advances to the allies and Great Britain's dominions, for the t dominipns were now beginning largely to finance themselves, but to the cost of t munitions and to the increased cost of food, amounting to 190,000 daily. In announcing that at the end of the current year the national debt would 1 stand-at between 3,500,000,000 and 3,- c 900,000,000, and that the advances to c Great Britain's allies and dominions would be approximately 390,000,000, Mr. Bonar Law asked whether the entente would be able to bear the burden of bringing the -t war to a successful conclusion. He said -I he had every confidence in the future and believed that the new loan of 550,- , 000.000 would be a success. . Mr. Bonar Law said the government had a difficult road fronting it as a na- , trion and that there would be no drawing back. Great Britain would be able to . stand the financial strain longer than her ' enemies, and it would not be on that ac- ; count that Great Britain would be forced : to make a disastrous peace. j There was considerable debate on the ! new vote of credit, but after Mr. McKenna Mc-Kenna had spoken it became uninteresting. uninter-esting. Would Recall Haig. Colonel Arthur Lynch, Nationalist, made reference to President Wilson's proposal for a world peace as the most momentous declara tion ever made in the iii story of nations, terming it a definite plan which, if followed by the civilized powers, would almost eliminate warfare. If the United States intervened in the present war, he said, this would secure a victory for the enten'e allies. Colonel Lynch strongly criticized the conduct of the war and demanded de-manded the recall of Field Marchal Sir Douglas Haig, the British commander in chief. Mr. McKenna's reference to the possibility pos-sibility of a general election provoked much lobbv gossip. This was based on the fact that the life of the present parliament par-liament expires at the end of April and the new vote would give the government enough money to carry on the war until after a general election, if it became necessary. nec-essary. The prevalent opinion was, however," how-ever," that the government would ask for an extension of the life off the existing parliament. |