There are a couple of anomalous cases where, by statute, the estimates for a service are not voted by Parliament, but the accounts are afterward submitted to it for approval. This is true of India; and the provision is a wise one, for it allows the government of that country to be conducted by the authorities on the spot, who are alone competent to do it, and yet it reserves to the House of Commons an opportunity for supervision and criticism. On one of the last days of the session a motion is made to go into Committee of the Whole to consider these accounts, and on that motion a general debate on Indian affairs is in order. In the committee itself only a formal motion is made certifying the total revenue and expenditure, and debate is confined to the economic and financial condition of the dependency.[291:1] In the same way the expenses of Greenwich Hospital are, by statute, defrayed out of its revenues, but the accounts are submitted to the House annually, with a resolution for their approval.[291:2] FOOTNOTES: [279:1] S.O. 67. [279:2] S.O. 66. May (527) points out that these two rules, together with S.O. 68, adopted in 1715, that the House will receive no petition for compounding a revenue debt due to the Crown without a certificate from the proper officer stating the facts, were for more than a century the only standing orders of the House. [279:3] Todd, "Parl. Govt. in England," 2 Ed., I., 691. [280:1] As an illustration of the fact that the rise of the authority exerted by ministers over Parliament was contemporary with the loss by the King of personal legislative power, Todd (II., 390) remarks that this rule was first adopted in 1706, and the last royal veto was given in 1707. [280:2] British North Amer. Act, § 54. Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act, § 56. After the government of India was transferred from the East India Company to the Crown, in 1856, the rule was extended to motions for a charge upon the Indian revenue. S.O. 70. [280:3] For France, _cf._ Dupriez, _Les Ministres_, II., 416-17, 421-30; Lowell, "Govts. and Parties," I., 116-17; for Italy, Dupriez, I., 316-19; Lowell, 207-9. Owing to the greater cohesion of parties, and to the fact that the expenditures are contained in a series of separate acts which can hardly be changed without disturbing the financial equilibrium, Belgium has suffered little from this cause. Dupriez, I., 249-52.