be retained under Imperial control.  Extravagance in the first three will not be properly checked, save by a responsible Ireland.  Nor will extra money on Education be properly spent until it is raised and spent by Ireland.  There are no other services, with the possible exception of Posts, to which a subsidy could possibly be applicable.  Even in that case an earmarked subsidy would be out of place.  But Posts are outside the point we are discussing.  If for mutual convenience they were to be kept under Imperial control—­a step which would not render imperative Irish representation at Westminster—­their finance would remain, as at present, common to the whole United Kingdom.  There is officially held, on bad evidence, to be a loss on Irish Posts of L249,000, and this loss is debited against Ireland, and goes to swell the deficit we have been considering.  With the Posts under Imperial control, the initial deficit to be made good by subsidy would be reduced by the amount of the loss.  Should it, however, be decided that Ireland is fairly entitled to a share of the large general profit earned by the Postal Services of the United Kingdom, the annual profit so attributable to Ireland would be set off against the annual subsidy as long as the subsidy lasted, and after it was at an end would be a clear item of revenue to Ireland.  My own opinion, as I stated in Chapter X., is that the Irish postal system, whether standing by itself it shows a profit or a loss, ought to be under Irish control.

III.

FUTURE CONTRIBUTION TO IMPERIAL SERVICES.

This must be left a voluntary matter for Ireland, as it is for the self-governing Colonies.  There is no contribution from Ireland at present, and to fix a future date at which a fixed contribution, like that from the Isle of Man, should begin, is a course hardly practicable even if it were desirable.

IV.

IRELAND’S SHARE OF THE NATIONAL DEBT.

Until two years ago Ireland, of course, contributed, inter alia, to the annual interest and sinking fund, amounting in 1910-11 to L24,554,000, on the National Debt of the United Kingdom.  It is impossible to estimate her share of the capital of the Debt, and I scarcely think that anyone would seriously propose to encumber the new Ireland with an old Debt, based on some arbitrary estimate.  For the great bulk of Debt created in the past she has little moral responsibility—­no more, at any rate, than the self-governing Colonies.  In this respect she must begin, like them, with a clean sheet.

V.

IRELAND’S SHARE OF IMPERIAL MISCELLANEOUS REVENUE.

On the other hand, Ireland, in consideration of the remissions mentioned, must renounce the share to which she is technically entitled of the Imperial Miscellaneous Revenue, derived mainly from Suez Canal shares and the Mint, and amounting altogether in 1910-11 to L2,769,500.[138]