The Daily Telegraph. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 29, 1883.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3883, 29 December 1883, Page 2

The Daily Telegraph. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 29, 1883.

The public of New Zealand cannot be too often reminded of the financial position of the colony, aurl to this end Mr J. W. Thomson," M.H.R. for Chitha, recently delivered an interesting lecture that brought the subject plainly before his audience. Major Atkinson, in his Financial Statement last session, said that the country wns sending away each year two millions and a half of money to pay interest on its indebtedness. Mr Montgomery wont into figures and showed that the amount sent away was over three millions and a half every year. The public debt is. £28,785,000. The harbor boards and municipalities have borrowed to the extent of at least £4,000,000. Tho mortgages on land under the Land Transfer Act amount to £21,683,000. At least the return furnished by" the department shews this. But it is said that the return is not very reliable, and apart from this it does not include mortgages on lands not under tho Land Transfer Act, some of which having been acquired in tho early times arc very valuable. These mortgages are supposed to be about one-third the amount of tho mortgages under the Laud Transfer Act. If so, and if tho Land Transfer return at all approaches correctness; tho mortgages would come to about £29,000,000. It is difficult to estimate the amounts held respectively by persons in the colony and persons outside the colony. Mr Montgomery is of opinion that tho amount held by persons outside the colony may be put down at £20,000,000. But the Treasurer estimates the amount at £16,000,000. With the view of not appearing to overstato the ease, Mr Thomson takes the Treasurer's estimate. Tho above particulars may be put shortly thus : — Public debt 28,785,000 Harbour and Municipal loans.. 'J ,000,000 Mortgages 10,000,000 £18,785,000 Interest on public debt .. 1,136,229 Harbour and municipal loans at say 7 per cent 230,000 Interest on mortgages—say 7 per cent, on an average .. 1,120,000 £2,836,229 On the 31st March last tho Colonial Treasurer had borrowed from Government Departments certain sums of money, giving as security Government bonds or Treasury bills. He had borrowed from the Government Savings Bank the sum of £1,322,000, from tho Life Insurance Department £615,000, and from the Public Trust office the sum of £112,000. Putting those sums together we (ret a total of £2,019,000. The X>iii>lio debt, therefore, may be said to be held to this extent indirectly by persons in the colony. As interest on this money is paid to the department from which it is boi-rowed, we may deduct for interest say £100,000 from the above sum of £2,836,000, thus leaving at the very least £2,730,000 of hard cash that has to bo sent out of the country every year. In addition to this the p7-ofits to homo-shareholders in banks in this colony must amount to a very largo sum. Tlicir share of the from discounting bills has been estimated at £300,000 per annum. There are also numerous other finance companies, all doing more or less business, and whose shareholders resident outside the colony must be drawing from us immense sums every year. And then there aro a great many persons owning property _in New Zealand, living at homo at their easeabsentees. The amount of money son t home to these absentees must large indeed. There are now so many of_ these persons that some special legislation in regard to them is necessary. If there is any class that ought to bo heavily taxed, this is the class. The Treasurer endeavored to be very facetious over Mr Montgomery's calculation that we are sending out of the country every year.£3,542,000 °f money in the shape of interest on our public and private debts. He said in substance this: If our imports arc £8,600,000 and our exports £6,000,000, and if do not belong to us, we are performing this wonderful feat,—with £3,000,000 we are purchasing goods to the value of £8,600.000, so that wo gain on last year's transactions no less a sum than £5,600,000. This, however, is far too serious a matter to get rid of in such an off-hand way as this. If we are importing goods to the value of £8,600,000 a year these havo to bo paid for, and if wo aro due to homo creditors interest to tho extent of about £3,500,000 a year, this also has to bo paid. If we aro not payingit out of the resources of the country, wo must be paying it in some- way. Wo must be paying it either out of our savings or by further borrowing, or partly by tho ouo prows? and partly by-tho other.

It is generally admitted that trade has been very dull lately. The Treasurer when making his financial statement admitted this, and it has been prominently referred to recently by tho chairman of the Duncdiu Chamber of Commerce, and also by the chairman of the Christchuroh Chamber. What is the cause of this dullness ? Is over-importation thn cause? Or is the large num. we have to pay as interest on our loans the cause ? Or is tho alleged depression in trade due partly to both of these and to other things as well ? Tho imports during the year 1882 amounted to £8,609,000. These have to bo paid for by sending money or goods out of the countiy. As Mr Thomson did not wish to mako things appear worse than they are, he took the Treasurer's own estimate of the money we arc sending out of tho country as interest on our public and private debts, viz., £2,500,000 per annum. The interest and imports together amount to £11,109,000. And what are the moneys that come into the country? Tho exports for the year amounted to £6,658,000. To the exports we have to add the borrowed money that was expended within the colony during the year. This amounted to £897,037. Then, again, there are always persons coming to tho colony and bringing money with them. jlt is difficult to estimate this, but a liberal estimate is supposed to be, say, £2,000,000. If we put these sums together we have a total of £9,555,000. If there is anj thing like correctness in these figures they show that the colony last year could not pay its way to tho extent of fully a million and a half.