General records of the National Debt Office

General records of the National Debt Office relating to the administration of the national debt and their responsibilities for the managment of other public funds.

The formal minutes of the National Debt Commissioners are in NDO 9, correspondence is in NDO 7, NDO 8, NDO 13 and NDO 15. Establishment papers are in NDO 6

Records of the eighteenth century relating to life annuities and tontines are in NDO 1-NDO 3

Payment books and other records concerning slave compensation following the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833 are in NDO 4

Records relating to the administration of trustee savings banks will be found in NDO 5, NDO 10, NDO 17 and NDO 19.

Records of the Trustee Savings Bank Inspection Committee are in NDO 11, NDO 12, NDO 16 and NDO 20

Records relating to the Jones Report on the National Debt, NDO 21

Specimens of documents from series which have been destroyed relating to all the above areas of business will be found in NDO 900

Records relating to Life Annuities will be found in NDO 1 , NDO 2 and NDO 22

• Loan of £1,500,000 under Act 5 Geo.III cap. 23 viz. £600,000 on 3% Annuities, £600,000 on a Lottery of 60,000 Tickets at £10 each, the blanks (at the rate of £6 each) and the prizes being funded in 3% Annuities, and as to the remaining £300,000 a Life Annuity at the rate of 3% with benefit of survivorship, the Nominees being formed into classes of £1500 a year each according to the numerical order of application except where the same Nominee was appointed in respect of two or more shares in which event he might at the option of the subscriber be placed in different classes. If, however, the whole portion of the scheme should not be taken up so much as remained might be subscribed into the 3% Annuities. The whole of the 3% Annuities created in respect of this Loan was directed by the Act to be added to the existing Reduced 3%. The Life Annuity portion of this scheme was known as the Second English Tontine. Subscriptions to the amount of £18,000 only were received, and the Annuity created was £540 an amount insufficient to complete even one of the six Classes contemplated. One hundred and thirty eight lives were nominated in respect of the 180 shares subscribed - the first half yearly payment of the Annuity being made at the 10th October 1766. Every half year's payment neglected to be demanded until 20 days before the expiration of the year was forfeited for the benefit of the other Annuitants, the Annuity paid to the survivors being increased from time to time partly from this cause but mainly from the death of Annuitants.
• These Life Annuities were issued in respect of a Loan of £6,000,000 authorised by Act 18 Geo.III cap. 22. Every subscriber of £100 money to receive £100 3% Consols with a short Annuity of £2. 10s. per cent for 30 years, or a Life Annuity payable at the Exchequer; and, in addition, for every £500 advanced four Tickets in a Lottery by the further payment of £10 for each ticket. The Life Annuities granted under the Act amounted to £2,849. 13s.
• These Life Annuities were issued in respect of a Loan of £7,000,000 authorised by Act 19 Geo.III cap. 18. Every subscriber of £100 money to receive £100 3% Consols with a short Annuity of £3. 15s. per cent for 29 years or a Life Annuity payable at the Exchequer; and; in addition, for every £1,000 advanced 7 Tickets in a Lottery by the further payment of £10 for each ticket. The Life Annuities granted under the Act amounted to £5,318. 18s. 7d.
• These Life Annuities were issued in respect of a Loan of £1,002,500 (Tontine of 1789) in sums of £100. 5s. each, the contributors or their nominees being distributed into six classes and receiving Annuities according to their ages, with benefit of survivorship in their respective classes, till the Annuity on the original share should amount to £1,000, after which the surplus of Annuity was to fall to the public. The Subscribers were allowed till the 10th October 1790 to nominate either their own life or that of any other person. The Annuities were to be payable half yearly at the Exchequer and as, owing to the period allowed for Nominations, the first half year's payment of the Annuities could not become due till the 5 April 1791 interest was allowed to the Subscribers at 4% per annum for 1 1/4 years to 10 October 1790 which was paid the 11 March 1791 and amounted to £50,104. 19s. The Annuities actually granted on the original terms amounted to £18,298. 7s. and were held by 3,518 subscribers in 4,219 shares. There were also 4,831 subscribers holding 5,733 shares who, becoming dissatisfied with the scheme, were allowed, by the Act 30 Geo.III c.45 to exchange their shares for Long Annuities having 69 1/4 years to run; and in order to keep faith with those who held to the original contract the Treasury was empowered to nominate other lives for the shares exchanged, who were thus termed"Government Nominees". The persons so nominated being for the most part persons in public station, and therefore not likely to be lost sight of through life, had no beneficial interest in the Tontine, their connection with it only serving to regulate the benefit of survivorship and to place the subscribers who held to the original contract as nearly as possible in the position they would have been had the original scheme been carried out in its entirety.
• The amount of Long Annuity, expiring in 1860, granted to the dissentient subscribers was £24,365. 5s., the Annuity in the Tontine relinquished by them amounting to £24,563. 14s. The last survivor in the Tontine died on the 31st October 1887.

Topics

Government finances

Pay and pensions

Slavery

National debt

Wills and probate

Banking

The Life Annuities Act 1808 empowered the National Debt Commissioners to grant life annuities charged upon funds created for the reduction of the national debt. In 1832 the Government Annuities Act transferred to them from the Receipt of the Exchequer the management of annuities already granted under various acts of George II and George III.

The administrative control of trustee savings banks (TSB) by the National Debt Commissioners (NDC) began in 1817 under an Act for the Protection and Encouragement of Provident Institutions or Banks for Savings in England. It continued to grow until the Trustee Savings Bank Act 1863 linked them even more firmly to the commissioners.

The original link between the NDC and TSB was a financial one, with the NDO investing, on behalk of the TSBs, the deposits received by them. Over the years there a gradual extension of government supervision of the banks and the NDO was the government department through which such supervision was exercised. NDO supervision took the form of a requirement on the TSB's to furnish returns to the NDO and later to obtain approval to various operations e.g. the acquisition or disposal of property, dealings in investments for the Special Investment Department. Other supervisory functions concerned TSB rules, staff superannuation, fidelity insurance and amalgamations.

In 1888, as the result of a series of defalcations in certain Trustee Savings Banks, a Parliamentary Select Committee was appointed to investigate the matter and report. Its findings resulted in the Savings Bank Act 1891.

On 3 July 1891 the Savings Banks Act received the Royal Assent. This Act, for amending the law relating to Savings Banks, was based mainly on the recommendations of the Select Committee on Trustee Savings Banks 1888-9, the principal feature being the appointment of an independent committee to supervise the system of working of the trustee savings banks.

Under section 2(2) of the Savings Bank Act 1891 a scheme for the appointment of an Inspection Committee was drawn up and approved by the National Debt Commissioners on 31 July 1891.

Under the scheme the Inspection Committee was to consist of seven members, one nominated by the Registrar of Friendly Societies, one by the Law Society, one by the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales and one by the Governor of the Bank of England. These four members were to select three more members from a list of nominees submitted by the larger trustee savings banks. To deal with the general working scheme of the Committee and in accordance with section 3 of the Act, the Committee appointed two sub-committees: Sub-Committee of Accounts and Sub-Committee of Rules.

Ten full-time Inspectors were appointed to inspect the books and audit the accounts of the banks. Their reports were submitted to the Committee for approval. The Committee in turn make annual reports of their proceedings to the National Debt Commissioners.

The duties of the Committee were: (i) To inspect books and accounts(ii) To satisfy itself regarding the security of the banks and the rules concerning audit(iii) To remove inactive Trustees(iv) To query any excessive or unnecessary expenditure

The Committee was an independent statutory body which was to report annually, and the first meeting was held on 12 November 1891. The Committee consisted of members nominated by the following: (i) Governor of the Bank of England(ii) Council of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales(iii) Councils of the Incorporated Law Society(iv) Chief Registrar of Friendly Societies The four members so nominated in turn elected three members from nominations forwarded by the Savings Banks.

The work of the Committee continued without any real interruption until 1970 when the Government appointed a committee to review National Savings. This was known as the Page Committee, chaired by Sir Harry Page.

The conclusions of this Committee were that Trustee Savings Banks should become a mutual banking organisation operating in a regional/national framework with a central organisation freed from specific government controls, and that banks should be amalgamated as quickly as possible. Within this reconstruction there was no place for an Inspection Committee because the new central organisation would have its own inspection system based on the principles developed by the previous committees.

The recommendations of the Page Committee were put into effect in 1975/1976 and the Inspection Committee was terminated on 20 November 1976, although its members did work on to produce the final annual report which is dated 21 April 1977.