R.S.A. Told What N.Z. Will Spend On Defence

Chronicle (Levin), 21 June 1949, Page 5

R.S.A. Told What N.Z. Will Spend On Defence

WELLINGTON, June 21. Defence plans for New Zealand would reach an expenditure of £17,000,000 a year, the Minister of Finance, Mr. Nash, stated at today's eonferenee of the N.Z.R.S.A. The estimates this year, he said, would be for a sum of between £12,000,000 and! £14,000,000, or £8 per head of population. This would involve for use in defence the services of 6-h persons per 1000. The latest figures for defence in the United) Kingdiom showed an annual expenditure of £760,000,000, or £16/2/- per head of population, said Mr. Nash. Sixteen persons per 1000 were engaged in defence. Aus♦ralia's latest figures were £87,000.000 or £11/14/- per hea'd, and seven persons per 1000 engaged in defence. Canada's expenditure, with a large sum set aside for seientific warfare resenrch, would be £11/19/- a head based on a personnel cpntribution of four per ib'oo:' :t"'1 t;,N ' Even though New Zealand's defence plans would mean more taxation, it would not be fair to evade : it and let other people carry the ] burden, said Mr. Nash, adding that New Zealand could not live except as a member of the British Commonwealth. To Britain's ppst-war effort Mr. Nash paid tliis tribute: "Nothing in history surpasses it."