EXPORT DUES.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2685, 15 November 1882, Page 3

EXPORT DUES.

[press association telegram.] DUNEDIN, November 14.

At the Chamber of Commerce to-day, Mr G. L. Denniston moved—“ That this meeting have heard with surprise and regret that the Harbor Board are levying an export duty of Is per ton as from September last. That, in the opinion of this meeting, the Harbor Board should exhaust all other means of raising revenue before resorting to an export tax, and the meeting suggest that existing import rates be raised, if need be, from Is and 2s to Is 6d and 3s respectively at Port Chalmers and Dunedin, and the imposition of an export tax be postponed until Parliament is again appealed to for the removal of the differential rates. That the committee of the chamber be requested to wait on the Harbor Board and undertake to arrange that an increase in the import dues be substituted for the proposed tax of Is per ton export.” All of them felt that an export tax was very troublesome and vexatious, and he had hoped that it would never have been forced again. Mr Henry Young seconded the motion. The chairman remarked, as a member of the Harbor Board, that body was not in favor of export dues, but in their present position could not avoid levying them. He himself as a merchant knew that the tax was a vexatious one, and that the merchants had to pay it out of their own pockets, but the Board could not see any other way out of the difficulty. Mr H. Guthrie agreed with the chairman’s remarks. After some slight discussion the motion was carried.