Mr. Header Wood's Speech

Auckland Star, Volume VI, Issue 1711, 12 August 1875, Page 2

Mr. Header Wood's Speech

Exposure of Government Finance-

(SPECIAL TO THE STAB.)

Mr. Rfader Wood after referring to the legal rloubts which beset the question, proceeded to criticise the Bill. Instead of one land law for the colony, the several land laws ot the provinces were to be perpetuated. For elected Superintendents, we were to have satraps appointed by the Central Government, and in the entire bill there was only one real reference to abolition, namely : the proposal to sweep away the Provincial Councils. But that benefit was counterbalanced by the strong centralising tendencies of the Bill, which perpetrated a double deceit, because it strengthened the North Island and broke faith with the South. The object of the bill was not abolition, but to enable the Government to cover an enormous deficiency in their finance. The expenditure chargeable to the consolidated revenue was estimated at £2,405,400, in which was included an item the House hod not been accustomed to, viz., expenditure on account of railways, £244,318. In that expenditure, as explained by the Treasurer, was included working expenses, £244,000, but besides that sum, together with ordinary charges, there should have been provided a depreciation fund, for if one was not provided in a short time people would not be able to travel upon the railways. As a depreciation fund there should be annually set apart a sum which should be kept- as absolutely intact as the sinking fund for loans. From that £240,500 might be deducted £50,000 as depreciation fund for railways. The consolidated revenue for the year was estimated at £2,476,193, which included two or three items the House had not seen before. First, there was provincial miscellaneous revenues, £50,000 of which was to be given to municipalities, but he waß not aware where the money was to come from unless it arose from the Otago Provincial Government's estimate of the receipts from the working of railways in that province. If that was the case, it must be included in the £294,000 of receipts. The total expenditure, therefore, was £2,455,400, and the total ordinary revenue, leaving out contributions to the land and railway funds, £2,180,189, leaving a deficiency of £275,211, which would be covered by appropriations from the land revenue of the South. Then as regards appropriation of the land-fund. First it was to be charged with the payment of interest and sinking-fund of loan, debts, and other liabilities. Then there were to be balances struck into two parts, one towards payments under the Immigration and Public Works Acb, and the other would be subject to appropriation by the Assembly. . The land fund, as estimated by the Treasurer amounted to £702,000, twothirds of which equalled 468.000 Z. (Major Atkinson: My estimate was more.) The last five years' average was 580,000 Z. This year the Otago Government estimated its land revenue at 200.000Z, and Canterbury hers at 120,000Z,; but he was not able to rind out how 702,000Z was likely to be reached, much less to be exceeded. There was consequently under the first head a total of 245.890Z ; under the second, for surveys' 247,626/! ; under the third, for payments to Road JBoards, 33.333Z; which, with the other two heads of public works and departmental services, made a total of £578,127. Thus, with the land revenue estimated at £468,000, there was a deficiency of £110,127. But since the Abolition Bill allowed the Governments to borrow £100,000 on security of the future land fund for those provinces which at present had none, the taking the whole of that deficient would be reduced to £10,127, which was divided into two equal parts. It seemed, to him that one mind had prepared the Bill and the financial statement, and another mind prepared the estimates without caring whether they agreed or not. That deficiency was to be divided into two parts, one-half being a charge for certain provisions of the Public Works and Immigration Acts, and for the support of charitable institutions. Very cold charity he was afraid it would be, for the Government , had not been able to make an estimate of it; and the other half was to be subject to appropriation by the Assembly for public works in Provincial districts. This was estimated at£1,608,168, 2s 2d. He concluded : To carry this bill would be to strike a blow at the credit of the colony under which it would reel again, and which would throw its finances into inextricable confusion. On the other hand, by examining all-these statements, looking carefully into the financial condition of the country, economising in every direction, and entering upon no new works until those in hand are completed, it is just possible that the colony might ride over the brink upon which we are standing. Mr Vogel well understood the finances of tho colony when he staid : " The country has got into a mess, and must get out of it as beat it could." (Loud Opposition Cheers.)