Pay as-you-earn Causes Trouble

Manawatu Times, Volume 69, Issue 63, 17 March 1944, Page 5

Pay as-you-earn Causes Trouble

‘ ‘ UNWARRANTABLE IMPOSITION” (Special Australian Correspondent.) Received Thursday, 8.10 p.m. SYDNBY, March 16. A strong protest is being made throughout Australia against the ?5 pec cent, surcharge in the Commonwealth’s pay-as-you-earn tax scheme. Legislation introducing the scheme is expected to he passed during the present session of Parliament. Protest resolutions demanding tho withdrawal of the sur charge are being made by well-attended public meetings. Under the Bill proposed by the Federal Treasurer (Mr. Chilly) only 76 per cent, of the income tax due in 1943-44 will he rehated to the taxpayers. At a Sydney meeting attended by 2000 people the secretary of the Taxpayers’ Association (Mr. John White) said the 26 per cent, surcharge was a confidence trick. Pay-as-you-earn taxation was admirable, hut the rub was that in changing from the old tax scheme to the new the Government would give the taxpayers two tax assessments in the coming year. Tbe first of these was the assessment of 26 per cent, on the ta.x normally payable for the year 1943-44 and the second was the normal annual tax for the vear 1944-46. The Federal Treasurer has , denied that his Bill entails any 26 per cent, surcharge. His denials, however, have been refuted by the Sydney Morning Herald editorially as well as by many other press and public authorities. The Herald describes the surcharge as “chicanery” and “an unwarrantable Imposition.” While the pending introduction of pay-as-you-earn taxation has been enthusiastically received throughout Australia the Government has been described as bringing down the scheme “only after being driven yard by yard with public opinion cracking the stockwhip behind it.” A former U.A.P. member of the Federal Parliament (Mr. E , s . Spooner), whose political abi'ity has been highly rated, said that the ?5 per cent, surcharge was nothing short of a tragedy. It showed, that Canberra both on tho legislative *nd administrative sides had nv'de no effort to take the reactions of tbe neople into its calculations. lie added that Australia’s combination of

high taxation and economic restrictions would develop national repression and an inferiority complex. He did not urge a reduction oi taxation at this stage but the announcement of a plan to reduce taxation immediately after the war would be a tonic for the nation at the present time.