Finance Bili Covers Numerous Items

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 216, 1 December 1927, Page 13

Finance Bili Covers Numerous Items

TOTALISATOR REFUNDS LEVT ON TIMBER (THE SUN’S Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON, Wednesday. In addition to providing authority for the raising of £7,000,000 in loan moneys the Finance Bill contains several items of interest, providing for expenditure in various departments and validating a number of financial adjustments. Provision is made for expenditure of funds on experiments in deteriorated Crown lands, for the transfer of tyre tax to the Main Highways Fund, and for the making of refunds of totalisator duty in connection with improvements to racecourses and hunt clubs’ equipment. It is proposed that county councils may make a levy on timber produced in the county not exceeding Id a 100 ft broad measure. The levy is to be payable only in respect of sawn timber from native trees that have not been planted. The object of the legislation is to recoup to local authorities the loss sustained through the reduced ratable value of the land through the cutting of the timber.

A clause proposes to validate agreements made between hospital boards and local authorities for the employment of applicants for charitable relief.

It is provided that moneys payable by the Fruit Export Control Board to owners of fruit may be paid to the New Zealand Fruitgrowers' Association, as agents for the owners.

Another clause in the Bill authorises the Public Trustee to convey the Auckland Trades Hall in Hobson Street to the trustees, and to advance £4,000 on first mortgage, thus making for compliance with an Act of 1922 that all capital owing to the Public Trustee should be repaid within five years. The rents and other sources of revenue from the hall have not been sufficient to enable the trustees to repay the original advance.

The Bill validates a donation of £250 made by the Auckland Savings Bank to the Mayor’s Unemployment Fund.

Special provision is made for the payment of an allowance of £1 10s a day as travelling expenses to the members of the Auckland Water Commission.

Another clause extends the purposes for which totalisator duty may be refunded under section 8 of the Finance Act, 1925. Refunds may be made in any case if the Minister is satisfied that they are required by the racing club for expenditure during the year, for the payment of interest on loans, for permanent improvements, for the repayment of any such moneys, for the discharge of any other liability incurred for such work, or for the purchase by any hunt club of sites for kennels, or for permanent improvements.

Authority is given to increase the amount that may be loaned to the Samoan Treasury from £16,000 to £46,000. From the profits accrued to the New Zealand Reparation Estates Account for the year 1927, £12,000 is to be paid to the Stmoan Treasury.

To enable experiments to be conducted with a view to bringing back to a state of fertility Crown lands that have deteriorated or are naturally lacking in productivity, land boards are empowered, with the approval of the Minister of Lands, to dispose of such lands on terms and conditions considered desirable. The Minister may remit wholly or in part or postpone the payment of interest on advances or rent.

The payment of £SOO tr the Gov-srnor-General as a grant in aid of special expenditure incurred by him In connection with the visit of the Duke and Duchess of York is authorised.

Another clause provides for the Periodical payment out of the Consolidated Fund into the Main Highways Revenue Fund of an amount equal to that estimated by the Controller of Customs to be the amount of customs duties received on rubber tyres and inner-tubes of rubber for Pneumatic tyres attached to or imported with motor vehicles, tractors or similar vehicles.

There is provision that all acts done on behalf of the Government in relation to the importation and sale of wheat from Australia in 1925 and 1926 shall be validated. Provision i 3 made tor a scheme of voluntary contributions by persons engaged in growing wheat and in related industries toward the cost of carrying out scientific investigations by the Department ®t Scientific and Industrial Research. The amount of levies payable by the various interests toward the establishment of laboratories and the employment of scientists is to be apportioned by regulations and are not to exceed (Id for every 50 bushels of wheat delivered by a producer to a miller or merchant, lid for every lou of flour or wheatmeal delivered from the flourmill, or lid for every ton of the products taken delivery of. The Provisions are to remain in operation until December, 1933, when they will be repealed.