RATING UNIMPROVED VALUES.

King Country Chronicle, Volume V, Issue 396, 16 September 1911, Page 5

RATING UNIMPROVED VALUES.

To the Editor,

Sir, —Like a good many more, I have often heard of rating on the unimproved value, but had never seriously considered the matter. It was only after hearing Mr Withy's clear explanation of the working of the system that it struck me as the only equitable basis of rating, particularly in a growing town like Te Kuiti. Under our present system, supposing A and B own adjoining sections of a value of £SO each, A builds a house valued at £4OO, and his rates immediately go up from, say (at a 2d rate) 8s 4(1 to 3 15s, which, if he is building to let, has to be passed on to the tenant, and if for his own use he has to pay himself, while B, who has just sat tight and done nothing, gets the benefit of the enhanced value created by his neighbour's improvements. Or, to put it another way, the people who have had sufficient faith in Te Kuiti to build the town as we see it, have to pay practically all the cost of the improvements now going on through their rates, while the man who owns the idle land which is going up in value through these improvements, pays practically nothing and gets the benefit.

It was the fact that Gisborne, and to get nearer home, such progressive towns as Hamilton and Frankton, had adopted the rating on the unimproved value, that first interested me in the subject, and after looking the matter squarely in the face I have come to the conclusion that if our present system of rating had been specially invented to stifle progress, it could not have been better designed. It is a remnant of one of the old laws imported from the Old Country which were specially designed to protect the interests of the grounds lord as against the interests of the people, and how it has survived so long in a so-called democratic country, is one of the things beoynd my comprehension. Why should the people who pay for the progress of a place be penalised, while the people who do nothing towards that progress reap the reward? With the legitimate speculator I have no fault to find (I am a bit of a speculator myself), but surely he will not object to pay his fair share uf the cost of improvements necessary to make the borough the place it ought to be, seeing he is sharing the benefits. —Yours, etc., EQUITY.