The undersigned the Clerks of the Roads gratefully considering the Report made by your Lordships to Government which recommends for them a Salary of Three Hundred Pounds p. Annum with their present privilege of franking Newspapers unimpaired ask permission to submit to your Lordships Notice the following
plan for increasing the circulation of Newspapers and in consequence the Revenue arising from the Stamp duty probably to the Amount of Eight thousand pounds p. Annum though attended by no additional expence to Government but entirely at their own risque and which they have determined immediately to execute should your Lordships arrangement take place.
They would first premise that when they were relieved by your Lordships from the payment they formerly made to the officers in this Department and from the Office which was filled by Mr. Tamineau, they reduced their charge from forty Pounds per Centum to Twenty & Twenty five Pounds per Centum on the prime cost of the papers which latter sum is the additional charge now made on the prime cost by all the Stationers Printers & Dealers who serve the Country with papers, and if in some cases it be less, it is on account of payment being made in advance.
They now propose upon the Establishment of your Lordships Arrangement to reduce the general charge on the prime cost from twenty and twenty five per Centum to ten and fifteen pounds per Centum, and as all the circulators of Newspapers will now regulate their charge for Newspapers sold in the Country by that of the Clerks of the Roads, the charge fixed by the Clerks will be the general one in the course of Six Months from its commencement.
This reduction will cause a greater demand for Newspapers in the Country many who now take a Weekly paper will then take a three day paper & many who now take a three day paper will then take a six day paper and two Persons who now join the expence of a Weekly or a three day paper may be induced by the reasonable charge to take each a paper or increase the number as above, and as the reduction becomes generally known which by the means of their Agents the Post Masters and other correspondents throughout Great Britain & Ireland it can be in fourteen days, the Stationers Printers and Dealers must likewise lessen their charge or risk the loss of their Customers.
By abolishing the monopoly once enjoyed by the Clerks in the Offices of the Secretaries of State, and the Clerks of the Roads in this Office, permitting the Public to send and receive Newspapers free, the number increased as this circumstance became known from—20,967 to 78,217 weekly and it is by confirming this liberty to the Public and by a reduction in the charge that the circulation of Newspapers and consequently the increase of Revenue is intended to be promoted. The probable increase in the number of Newspapers circulated in the Country through the above reduced price may be stated at the lowest computation at one half penny each upon one hundred Newspapers each Clerk of the Road, one hundred
each of the twenty principal Stationers & Dealers and for the more inconsiderable Dealers which are very numerous fifty of whom are known Four hundred papers by every poste, which together will make the additional number circulated every Post three thousand.
By preserving the privelege of franking to the Clerks of the Roads a competition will be occasioned between them & the other Dealers, the Public will be supplied on more moderate terms, and an increase of consumption will be promoted but should this competition be destroyed by the abolition of the privelege of the Clerks of the Roads, the principal Dealers purchasing the business carried on by less extensive circulation might thereby occasion a monopoly and then fix the price as it might suit their private interest and diminish the number of Newspapers circulated thereby greatly injuring the Revenue as formerly by the monopoly of the Clerks of the Secretaries of State and the Clerks of the Roads for it would be the interest of the Stationers and other Dealers as it was that of the Clerks under Government to sell a less number at an advanced price, the Capital employed would not be so large nor the trouble nor the risk so great.
The Clerks of the Roads here beg your Lordships attention to a proposal which there is no doubt will occasion a yet further increase of circulation of Newspapers, it has been before stated to your Lordships in the Report upon the Plan proposed by the Commissioners relative to a Tax on Newspapers that before the duty of one penny postage was laid on all Newspapers sent by Post to Ireland, the Weekly number remitted to that Kingdom was upon an Average 8,000, and that the Weekly number now sent upon an average is only 1,380, should Government consent to repeal this duty it is evident from the above statement that they would gain a considerable Sum the Clerks of the Roads will with pleasure make a considerable reduction in their charge to Ireland, as in the case of home consumption which will be a means of still further extending of circulation.