CORRESPONDENTS' VIEWS

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIII, Issue 170, 21 July 1942, Page 4

CORRESPONDENTS' VIEWS

the NEW INCOME tax rule

(To The Editor)

The Chamber of Commerce discussion on the power taken by ParhaSent for the better collection of inZme tax opens up some interesting questions. The discussion arose out o"a letter from the Freedom Assertion. the tone of which suggested shat the new power was some evil thing invented by the present Government. Those who nave not had occasion to consider the matter would never guess that the new Act contained but a small inst*ment cf the provisions of the hmgiisn acl. The New Zealand Act enables the Commissioner to collect unpaid taxes from persons owing money to the defaulting taxpayer, and permits he nerson so paying to deduct tne amount from what he owes to the This common-sense Jlmedy against the disloyal shirker wjS characterised as "one of the wrrst examples of Government by bureaucrat, as placing "the whole commercial community in an inferior position to the Commissioner, as infringing "the right of the debtor to state I case to the Courts," as flouting" the Courts, and so on. Three very experienced gentlemen did what they could to show that the new Act did none of these terrible things, but their superior knowledge was disregarded, and a resolution of protest was passed. The facts behind all the shouting are simple. Only the disloyal shirker is affected. Only the man who has received his income, who has made a formal return of it, who has had a formal assessment of his debt, who lias been invited to object to that assessment, who has been given a month in which to object, who has hao the right of appeal to the Court if he is not satisfied, who has been given from eight to 14 months from the receipt cf his income in which to pay, and who, finaliy. has shirked payment. And though the decent taxpayer has to make up the loss the shirker causes, we are assured that ?c to force his hand is one of the worst examples, etc., etc. The sooner the principle of ."payment at the source" is adopted here, the sooner the honest man will be relieved from making up the losse* incurred from the shirker. J. G. HADDOW.