cusp. rf] THE COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA 901
meet an additional expenditure then calculated at nearly
£3,000,000, and the plan of raising £5 to obtain £2 was absurd.
He suggested that in future the Braddon clause should be
abolished and the surplus revenue returned : he was prepared
 to guarantee £5,000,000 and £250,000 for Western
Australia. This was based on five years’ returns of the
customs and excise less the average expenditure on nonproductive
 services, plus £2,000,000 for old age pensions and
£1,000,000 for other services; the distribution would be per
capita and would work out at £1-205 of the population.
The defeat of Mr. Fisher in June 1909 resulted in the
return of Sir John Forrest to the position of treasurer, and
in August a conference was held at which a final agreement
was reached under which the states should receive £25
per head of the population with an extra allowance of
£250,000 for Western Australia, diminishing by £10,000 a
year the allowance to be provided by the other states on
a population basis. It was agreed that the arrangement
should be placed on a firm basis by making it a part of the
Constitution, and the Bill for this purpose actually managed
to gef through the Senate, though everything turned on how
Mr. Irvine and others would vote in respect of the unpopular
attempt to make it permanent. Tt was rejected, however,
by three states out of six at the referendum in 1910,! but
happily it was passed as a simple Act in the same year,
No. 8 of 1910. simplifying the position of finances im-+

 Namely New South Wales, Victoria, and South Australia against,
the others for, and a total of over 25,000 against in all. The voting was:
New South Wales, 227,650 for, 253,107 against; Victoria, 200,165 and
242,119; Queensland, 87,130 and 72,516 ; South Australia, 49,352 and
51,250 ; Western Australia, 49,050 and 30,392; Tasmania, 32,167 and
21,454: being totals of 645,514 to 670,838. 82,437 papers were informal ;
28.58 of the electorate voted for, 29-70 against; see Commonwealth
Parliamentary Papers, 1910, No. 1, p. 20. In the case of the State Debts
referendum the results were: New South Wales, 159,275 for, 318,412
against ; Victoria, 279,392 and 153,148 ; Queensland, 102,705 and 56,346 ;
South Australia, 72,985 and 26,742 ; Western Australia, 57,367 and 21,437 ;
Tasmania, 43,329 and 10,186. Total, 715 053 for, 586,271 against; 31.66
for. 25.96 against ; 96,209 papers were informal.