The Sun WEDNESDAY, JUNE 6. MONEY MAKES THE MARE TO GO

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 373, 6 June 1928, Page 10

The Sun WEDNESDAY, JUNE 6. MONEY MAKES THE MARE TO GO

pOURAGE is not confined exclusively to famous airmen. Horse owners and supporters of racing also possess the virtue, and where it falls short of pluck and prowess, it takes the form of admirable optimism. Thus representative men of the Turf in Otago had the temerity to approach the Minister of Finance at Dunedin yesterday and plead for a reduction in the heavy burden of taxation on the popular sport. The Hon. W. Downie Stewart was sympathetic in manner and at heart, but there was little or no generosity in his speech. It is reported that the national treasurer said he could not give the deputation much hope of a reduction in taxation on racing. Probably Mr. Stewart realised that, if it be money that makes the mare to go, it is the hard taxation on her going somewhere almost every day that goes to make the money go in expensive State activities and departmental extravagances. In any ease, it looks as though the extravagant sport of racing will be rowelled deeply by the taxation highwaymen for at least another season.

Those who least regret the hopelessness of horse owners and breeders in respect of their poignant plea for reduced taxation will regret it most if the Minister’s reply to the Dunedin deputation should mean that there is to he no reduction in taxation at all this year. The Minister, when he likes and particularly so if urged by a conscientious sense of duty, can be as obdurate as Pharaoh, but if he persists in refusal to reduce taxation this year and thus keej) heavy fetters on enterprise, he and his colleagues in the Government will have to be prepared to suffer the plague of hostile public opinion. Everybody throughout the whole country to-day is wondering why industry is slack, why business is sluggish, and why enterprise is hesitant and compelled to go forward on leaden feet. There is much political talk about the Dominion having, turned the corner at last, and that all’s well with New Zealand. Production is good and more given to an increase than to the opposite direction. Prices for the country’s main products are anything hut had. Moreover, the Dominion’s credit or power to borrow is high, while the State borrowers assert that most of their loans are devoted to reproductive works and profitable purposes. And yet, in spite of reasonabty favourable conditions and ardent political optimism, to say nothing about the good influences of efficient administration, trade and commerce are in the doldrums, while hundreds of able-bodied men haunt charitable soup kitchens. The cause of the depression that baffles so many competent economists and shrewd business men is plain enough. It is the burden of taxation. Before the country can look for a penny’s worth of solid, real prosperity, it has to provide approximately £17,000,000 in direct and indirect taxation. This sum is more than three times the taxation aggregate in 1913. There is nothing to be gained from excuses or argument about it. The burden is there —a grievous incubus. A wandering sage declared the other day that it was no good tackling post-war problems with the pre-war mind. True, indubitably true, but the people also realise that it is no good trying to pay for a pre-war standard of living with a post-war purse. The Reform Government seeks and needs restoration of popularity. The shortest cut to success will he a deep cut into the burden of taxation.