CORRESPONDENCE.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume VII, Issue 290, 5 December 1872, Page 2

CORRESPONDENCE.

"U THE VOGEL-LUCKIE ART OF BOOKKEEPING. To the Editor op the Nelson Evening Mail. Sir — It has been said that "figures are merce-. nary characters that can be pressed into any service." No better illustration of this could have been afforded than by Mr. Luckie in his out-of-parliament speech the other night, when ventilating his criticism on Mr. Gillies 5 financial knowledge. It is to be found, paraphrased as all the rest of the speech is, in ye&terday's Colonist as follows : — MC He (Mr. Gillies) made actual assets, money in hand, savings on the year, not to he expended — he entered these moneys as " Liabilities;" I shall read the entry from his Financial Statement : — £ s. d. Accumulated savings on Civil- List Fund ... - 5618 17 2 Ditto, ditto, Armed Constabulary • Reward Fund 2362 13 9 Ditto, ditto, Native School Fund ... 9603 14 8 making a sum of £17,585. Now this sum was an actual saving, an asset, but Mr Gillies puts this down as a liability with his eyes open, for he says in a foot-note : — " These savings I place as a liability, because any- Government may at any time draw from the Consolidated Fund on account of them, without any vote of the Legislature. Tbey will not probably be required durin-*- the current year, but they are nevertheless a liability which should always be kept in view." Now by putting this £17,500 on the debtor side of the' account, when it i 3 actually an asset — money to credit — Mr. Gillies at once creates an apparent deficit of £35.000. The thing is a gross absurdity,, but this was the way the. present Opposition and the Opposition leaders endeavored to make out the charges against their predecessors in the Ministry." Mr Luckie treats the figures in question on " actual assets "" an actual saving, an asset." It did not, perhaps, suit Mr Luckie to explain tbat these " savings " were sums at the credit of certain funds for which the Colonial Government were trustees, and for which the Colonial Treasury was a debtor, and liable to be called upon to pay, if not this year, at any rate, in the next or future years. Yet Mr Luckie, with the assumption of a professional accountant, told his audience that these figures were an " asset," " money to credit," and not a liability. God help the colony or anything else that has its finances manipulated in such a fashion. After such an ad captandum speech as Mr Luckie made on Friday nfght, it is to be hoped that he will never have the billet of either - Public Trustee or Auditor-General conferred upon him, for without any imputation on his personal honor, it must be plain, even to the . merest tyro in book-keeping, that tbe acquirement, of the simplest rudiments of that science has been omitted in his education. : Yours, &C.J .7. 7 An Accountant. Nelson, December 4, 1872.. For continuation of news see fourth page.