Untitled

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1319, 6 November 1880, Page 2

We have received the following memorandum :

Property Tax Department. Tirnani, sth November, ISSO.

Memorandum for the Editor Oamaru Mail. Dear Sir,—l am instructed by the Commissioner to ask yon to be good enough to have inserted in your paper a local news paragraph to the effect attached. —Yours faithfully, Thomas Howley, Deputy Commissioner. The matter is o£ so great importance to tho3e in this district who are liable to taxation under the Act, but who have not yet obeyed the mandate of the department, that we accede to the request. As will be observed, the paragraph is substantially the same as the last advertise-

merit of tl>: 'Vti-ii rn.pnl. which was inserted, ucc-.! r„ ir* ••u<--:ior.. u , in our c•••lir.;::... f: rut.sPh.f«sio«s: Instructions iw«, bten given io.the Deputy er. trj take iinniediats proceedings agaiusr al! purso s who have failed to make a SM..i'-cn»esit of Uici.* ; rcpertv under "The Assessment Act." We th.v.t prompt tiiect; is to' be given to these iiu raeibas. At the time tn,.: 4 .i-e nt u),pea red. we co:;u;;.-;;K<-d ;-,n ihu absurdity of inserting s'.u !i a,. ;m:'."na ! :t announcement only once. It- sought to effect the object fur which all previous announcements from the department had been made—the realisation of the tax. - The result of the parsimony of the Government in this mutter proves that our commenti wen- called for. Through insufficiency of notification defaulters are numerous, though many of them who live in remote districts, and only occasionally see a newspaper, have not designedly treated the departments demands contemptuously. The department now gives defaulters another chance of saving themselves frotn the expense and annoyances of legal proceeding?. Isut this time I Ivy do not even send us an adverris. mem. A local is more inexpensive thai. is 10 snv, to the Government. This howev:v, not the moss serious complaint that can b6 raited against the conduct of ttie department The local only appears once, and its results niaj' therefore prove j>s barren as those of the last advertisement, unless the Press makes tip for the shortcomings and defective management of the department b} r keeping the matter before the people in a string of locals, so that it shall not be so likely to escape the notice of any of them.