The Evening Star FRIDAY, JULY 1, 1870.

Evening Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2231, 1 July 1870, Page 2

The Evening Star FRIDAY, JULY 1, 1870.

Changes in the tariff are always an annoyance to merchants, rctaileis, and buyers. They unsettle every ai tide affected by them. There is no certainty in trade wherever revenue is dependent mainly upon import duties, A thousand influences, real or imaginary, are at work, tending to* induce alterations for individual profit or the necessities of the country. The crotchets of a Treasurer bent on bringing into existence some pet scheme 6f manufactures for which the countij is not prepared, are sometimes indulged in without reference , to the industries he destroys, or the cost at which , his experiment, even if successful, puts the countly to. For instance, it is said that in order to bolster up some imaginary factory at Nelson, the duty oh coarse woollens has been raised from three shillings a cubic foot to five. By this financial feat it is calculated that every pair of blankets or rags will bo raised in price about two shillings to three or more, or something like 15 per cent, on low-priced goods. The returns of imports for the year shew that the the value of woollens was somewhere about £145,000. As in the return there is no distinction made as to the value of blankets and rags, which paid three shillings per cubic foot, and woollens that were charged five .shillings, we have no means of aocuiately ascertaining what additional tax is laid upon consumers for the benefit of half a hundred people in Nelson. Probably if we take one-third of the amount of imports as the value of the lower class of goods, it will be much under the mark. But adopting that estimate,.or say in round numbers <£50,000, miners, shepherds, and settlers mainly, are additionally taxed to the extent of £7,500 a year, or £18,750 annually, instead of £11,250, in order that a venture may succeed that cannot for years to come benefit the country to one-eighteenth of the value of the duty. But every change in Customs is a source of annoyance and injustice. So anxious is a finance minister to reap the full benefit of the additional tax, and to forestall the merchants, that orders are sent to the revenue officers to charge the proposed addition almost before the announcement has passed the lips of the Tigisurer. Occasionally a nice little kicking has been realised by some nftrehants who contrive by hook or by crook to discern the signs of the times, i? ov the sake of many of our friends we should have been glad of a little information from the spirit world of what was hatching in the Treasury bureau, and we think the guardian spirits a set of very shabby fellows not to drop a line at one or other of the various seances, that might have put. some money into the pockets of eur Dunedin merchants. C nfortunately the Custom House appears to have been better informed on the subject, and to have adopted a course that seems to us very like palpable injustice. On account of the different rates of duty chargeable on different qualities of woollens, what are termed u sight entries, are passed on a certain number of specified packages, and a sufficient sum of money is deposited at the Custom House to cover the highest rate of duty payable ; any excess being returned when on examination, the account is finally adjusted. It so happens that, in several instances, large payments have been made on account of goods to be landed \ but as the goods are either yet on board the ship or not landed * from the lighter, although the Customs authorities have had the full amount of duty in their hands that was payable at the time of passing the entry, they claim the right to charge the additional rate of duty on the whole of the goods included in that entry, simply because the exact sum is not finally adjusted. We cannot exactly blame the officers for this, for we suppose they act under orders. But we cannot but regard it ns gross injusticein fact a breach of contract. On a given day an entry is passed for a certain number of packages specified, and an equal or larger sum of money is paid to the revenue officers than will cover the highest dut} r chargeable. To all intents and purposes then the obligation of the importer is fulfilled—the duty then payable is paid or overpaid ; and it is monstrous to say because the account is unadjusted that a subsequent addition to the tariff shall be made. The theory is, and the answer given, “ You should have completed the “ the entry when the goods were “landed.” We reply that the noncompletion, as it is called, of the entry was an arrangement between the revenue department and the merchants for mutual convenience : that it saved time and trouble } that had the u cu-

“ tries been completed,” the lower rate of duty have been charged, and that c|lfAccepting the deposit in lieu of the actual sum payable, the Government entered into a binding contract to allow all goods included in that entry to go into consumption at that rate of duty—in fact that they are in possession of the sum due, and not entitled to a fraction more. In all reductions care is taken to guard the revenue by giving notice. We acquit the Customs officers of any desire than in the course'’ of their duty to guard against loss to the revenue ; but if the extra duty is claimed and insisted on, even if sustained in the Supreme Court, wc shall ever denounce it as a deliberate swindle.