At the end of 1883 the Griffith Ministry succeeded to office with a strong following. It was early in March, 1884, that the Appropriation and Loan Acts for 1883-4 became law, but the regular session of the year did not begin until 7th July. It was in this session that the Government introduced their colossal railway extension scheme, and their famous "Ten-million Loan Act"--actually, however, the amount was L9,980,000. This sum was to be spent during the following five years, which meant that the members of the Assembly voted in a lump sum, and on an unprecedented scale, the loan expenditure for the maximum term of the Parliament. The effect was also to ensure the life of the Ministry for the same term, as it was intended to expend about 2 millions sterling a year, or about L6 10s. per annum per head of the population. This was equal to about three-fourths of the total consolidated revenue for 1884. The Ministry no doubt meant well, and their preparation of a schedule of works to extend over five years was in the abstract commendable. But the expenditure of so much loan money provoked inflation in values, and led to unhealthy speculation in land. Although Ministers did not in any one year quite reach their 2-million conventional limit of loan outlay, the 10 millions were exhausted soon after their retirement from office, and a further loan had to be authorised to finish their uncompleted works. While such railways as the "Via Recta" (Ipswich to Warwick) and the Cloncurry to the Gulf lines were both on the 1884 loan schedule--the amount set down for each being L500,000--they have never been even commenced to this day, a quarter of a century since they were passed by the Assembly. Other lines then authorised absorbed more than the amount voted, and necessarily had afterwards to be completed to make them reproductive. The revenue not proving as expansive as the necessities of the Treasury required, an Act passed in 1885 imposed 5 per cent. ad valorem duties upon most kinds of industrial machinery, increased the spirit duties to 12s. per gallon, and levied upon log and undressed timber a duty of 1s. per 100 feet superficial and upon dressed timber of 1s. 6d. per 100 feet. In the following year the ad valorem duties were increased to 71/2 per cent., except as to machinery, which remained at 5 per cent.; but small levies like these were as drops in the bucket by comparison with the constantly expanding needs of the Treasurer.