or other persons, would not neces sarily stop the proceedings in such action.

That as the particular ground of action does not necessarily appear upon the writ or upon the declaration, the court, before which such action is brought, cannot stay the suit, or give judgment against the plaintiff, till it is informed, by due course of legal proceeding, that such action is brought for a thing done by order of the house.

And it therefore appears to your committee, That even though the house should think it to commit the solicitor or other person concerned in commencing these actions, yet it will still be expedient that the house should give leave to the speaker and the serjeant to appear to the actions, and to plead to the same; for the purpose of bringing under the knowledge of the court the authority under which they acted and if the house should agree with that opinion, your committee submits to the house, whether it would not be proper that directions should be given by this house for defending the speaker and the serjeant against the said actions.

Extract of the Fifth Report of a Committee of the House of Commons on Public Expenditure. [Ordered by Hon. House of Commons

to be printed, April 18, 1810.]

Being informed that a considerable default had been discovered in the office of Paymaster of Marines, the committee directed their first inquiries to the nature of the regulations under which that department is conducted; with a view to ascer

tain whether those regulations are insufficient in themselves, or ill adapted to the service, or whether there has been a culpable or negligent departure from them.

The paymaster whose duty is confined to the payment of the marines while on shore, presents monthly accounts to the Admiralty, stating his receipt and expenditure during the last month, with an estimate of the probable demands upon him for the current month, together with a statement of the balances remaining in his hands on the first and last days of the preceding mouth; in consequence of which application, an order is forwarded to the Navy Office, accompanied by a copy of the monthly account, directing an imprest to be issued by the Treasurer of the Navy, who is the general banker, as the Navy Office is the general office of account, for every branch of naval service. A statement of the balances in the paymaster's hauds included in the monthly account, is transmitted with the order for each imprest to the Navy Office.

This statement of the balances in these monthly accounts affords, in appearance, a secure and constant guard against any undue accumulation of money in the hands of the paymaster; but this appear ance is delusive: for these accounts being necessarily unaccompanied with vouchers, do not admit of any effectual check, until the delivery, at a subsequent period, of the general annual account. The consequence of which has been, that they have unfortunately produced the effect of preventing rather than forwarding any useful examination into the real state of the paymaster's balance; and seem to have preclud

ed

ed all suspicion, either at the Admiralty or Navy Office, of any improper accumulation of money in bis hands.

In the printed regulations and instructions relative to the royal marine forces while on shore, the seventh article directs "that the paymaster is to pass an account with the Commissioners of the Navy at the end of every year; he is to deliver a general account of all money received and paid within that time." If it was the duty of the paymaster to pass, it became the duty of the Commissioners of the Navy to examine; and your committee cannot view without great dissatisfaction the delay which has prevailed in the delivery of the general annual accounts; the causes of which will be noticed hereafter.

The practice of the office with respect to the accounts of the Paymaster of Marines, appears to have been this The monthly accounts already alluded to, which are transmitted by the Admiralty to the Navy Office, receive no particular examination, and indeed, do not admit of being checked, as before stated, except in the articles of imprest and balances brought over from the preceding month; but an examination of these items alone would obviously not ascertain the correctness of the balance remaining.

The general annual account when delivered is examined with the imprest ledger on the one side, and with the accountant's vouchers on the other, by one or more of the clerks in the office of bills and accounts; by them the balance stated by the paymaster is confirmed or corrected. A statement is then made out by the person who has

examined the account, of the disbursements only, detailing the nature of them and of the vouchers, with observations on any irregularity in either, on the authority under which the payments were made, or on any other circumstance deserving notice. The statement so made out by the examining clerk should be checked by the chief clerk, and is then submitted to the Committee of Accounts; and it is their duty after due consideration, to direct the sums disbursed and properly vouched to be allowed towards clearing such imprest as may be standing out against the accountant. To what sum this imprest may amount, is not however brought under the notice either of the Committee of Accounts or the Board (unless specially called for) the statement itself not containing the imprest, or the balance remaining; and the original annual account never undergoing their revision. And here your committee cannot but express their surprise, that the general practice of the office should have sanctioned so extraordinary an omission in the statement of any account, as that of the sum owing by the accountant to the public: and that in this particular instance the examining clerks should not have deemed it their duty to bring under the immediate notice of that Committee, an article of such magnitude and importance. They trust this practice has been at length effectually corrected by a minute of the Navy Board, dated the seventeenth of January, 1810. In other respects it appears to your Committee, from the inspection of many of these statements which have been laid before them, that the disbursements in the paymaster's account

have received an attentive and accurate investigation: and it further appears from a document produced by the Navy Board, that few of the accounts in the office of Bills and Accounts are in arrear, and none greatly so; and that the balances of none of them are so large as to excite suspicion.

The Honourable George Villiers was appointed Paymaster of Marines by the Board of Admiralty, the nineteenth of March, 1792, aud re-appointed as Paymaster and Inspector, the ninth of May, 1803; with particular directions as to the mode in which his department was to be conducted, enjoining him to make frequent visits to the different divisions and stations of Marines, from the want or neglect of which, great abuses had prevailed.

His

salary was raised by that warrant to £1000 clear of all deductions, with an allowance of £530 for his clerks, £190 for house-rept, &c. and a further allowance for travell ing expences actually incurred. No examination as to the state of bis accounts, which remained unsettled for seven years at the period of this re-appointment, appears to have taken place, nor was the amount of his balance known or inquired into; which is now ascertained to have been, at the end of 1802, 177,847.

His accounts, which had been passed with tolerable regularity and expedition in 1794 and 5, fell into great arrear in the subsequent years, both as to the time of delivery and the settlement of them.

presented to Mr. G. Villiers, that his accounts ought to be more ́re gularly delivered in, and received assurances from him that they should be so; at the same time Mr. Villiers stated the necessity of having the imprests made to him in full, when the pressure of the public service, about the year 1798, made it expedient to pay only in part; and the comptroller was led to believe from his conversations with Mr. G. Villiers, that there was no balance of public money at that time in the accountant's hands.

It is to be remarked with great regret that the inefficient state of the Navy Office, for å period of no less than eleven years, is given as an excuse or palliation for this omission on the part of the Board; and some of the new regulations adopted under an order in council of June the eighth, 1796, at the recommendation of the commissioners of inquiry, are alledged as a principal cause of the defective state of this office.

The strongest representations from the Navy Office to the Admiralty were made on this subject, at different times from 1800 to 1807; one great and obvious inconvenience was pointed out as arising from making the chief clerk in the office of bills and accounts, secretary to the committee of accounts (which was recently formed of three members of the Board, agreeably to the directions of that order in council) while the same person had the superintendance also of the foreign accounts; this inconvenience the Navy Board endeavoured to remedy by some official arrange ments, which diminished but did not remove the evil; and it continued to be felt, until the duties of VOL. LII.

these separate departments were allotted to three distinct officers.

The hardships suffered by the clerks in general from the low state of their salaries and the abolition of fees, the consequent inactivity and langour which prevailed in the different departments, and the difficulty of carrying on the business, are enumerated in this correspondence; but the actual evils from the accounts not being passed are not perhaps set forth with sufficient force, or with those details which were calculated to impress the Admiralty with a due sense of them. Your committee however cannot but remark the neglect with which these representations were treated. No answer whatever appears to have been made to them before June, 1806, aud no remedy was applied. by the Admiralty until November, 1807, to a case which involved the efficiency of this great and most important office of account.

The balance exhibited in Mr. G. Villiers's monthly account immediately subsequent to the thirty-first of December, 1802, when the ba lance was 177,8471. amounts to no more than 2,2551.; and after the thirty-first of December, 1803, when the balance on the settlement of the general account for that year proved to be 256,539 1. the balance to which his name was subscribed amounted only to 12,0551.

Your committee, notwithstanding some pains taken to discover the method by which these monthly balances were made to exhibit so fallacious a view of the whole sum actually in the accountant's hands at any given time, have not been able to satisfy themselves as to the particular mode by which the real balance was kept out of sight. It

Gg

was

was suggested by one of the late marine clerks, that such parts of the imprests as were not received within the current month, were never subsequently brought to account; but with the exception of 10001. (drawn out on the tenth of July, 1799) there is certainly no foundation for this suspicion; and it seems probable, that the generality of the statements of expenditure in the monthly accounts, unaccompanied as they necessarily were by any vouchers, may have served as a cover for large sums of money, which in fact never may have been applied to the public service.

Not deeming it essential to pursue this part of the subject further, your committee applied themselves to ascertain what steps had been taken on the discovery of these deficiences to secure the public from loss; and they find that extents were issued to the whole amount of the accountant's property; which however falls far short of the amount for which Mr. G. Villiers appears to be responsible to the public, unless there should be articles of discharge unknown to your committee or to the Navy Office, in the present unsettled state of his

made a condition of his holding the office, that he should give security in the sum of 10,000l. without reference to the security taken in 1792.

Your committee cannot avoid observing upon it as an omission of duty in the Board of Admiralty, by whom he was re-appointed, not to have taken a second bond; and the loss of the first, which remained in the Admiralty about the year 1806, shows a culpable carelessness as to the custody of such important instruments. Securities ought to be taken more frequently than has hitherto been the usage, from all officers in every department who hold situations connected with the receipt or expenditure of public money; and your committee recommend that regulations should be established to that effect, under the directions of his majesty in council or of the commissioners of the treasury.

Large issues continued necessarily to be made between the end of 1804, and the time when the late paymaster quitted his office, amounting to 2,085,8921.; but though this sum swells most considerably the balance of money to be accounted for, calculations which have been formed in the Navy Office lead that board to conjecture that the whole of it has been applied to the service for which it was imprested.

Money paid on the Royal Marine

Service, between the first of January, 1805, to the latest period to which the same is made up.

From Jan. the 1st to Dec. 31st 1805..... 339,001 2 1

The