The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE. FRIDAY, MAY 14, 1915. HOSPITAL FINANCES

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 7, Issue 209, 14 May 1915, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE.

FRIDAY, MAY 14, 1915. HOSPITAL FINANCES

(With which is inco. rgw rated The T&3 hape Post Una Wa. 'marine News.)

The enormously increfc ’-Bed demand made by the "W anganui Hospital and Charitable Aid Board this year upon local bodies for the upkeep of the various institutions under its control, is being resented by almost every _ contributing body in the district, and it is only within the environs o| Wanganui that the assessments o t , the Board are defended, and advocated. Without doubi,. members of local bodies in this li°spita! District realise that a time, o '' very heavy rating is before tf'-- y vonvji-r 'y ■ ;• soldiers’ pension fund

will have to be provided for, the cost of the war, and of many other matters of heavy expenditure closely connected with it will be forced upon the general taxpayer to a very large extent in the near future, and they now view with alarm the huge increase of income demanded by the Board — an increase which they are not inclined to silently submit to. The Rangitikei County Council has asked for more understandable details of past expenditure and also of the expenditure this year’s assessments are based 021. It is little use following up the former trail, for, although the statement for 1914 does not give the information it reasonably might have done, it indicates pretty clearly that, to put the most favourable construction on it, the Board made a most unfortunate estimate of its requirements. The only other alternative is that expenditure of an extraordinary or not really necessary character has been indulged in. There may be a little in both these aspects, but that should not warrant the issue of a demand that will double the receipts frecontributing bodies. The finances during the year are apparently on the wrong side by some seventeen hundred pounds and instead of doing as most business exper/ would do, that is, improve organisation and administration, and practice, in such hard times, careful economy, as well as cease launching out into matters that fringe, if nothing else, on the speculative, they do as the most uninitiated tyro would, by reaching out for more money to spend. The items given in the balancesheet cannot very well be questioned, excepting those coming under the heading of capital expenditure. No business man would credit that when the Board formed the estimate of its requirements for 1914, it had contemplated an expenditure on new buildings, hospital and office requirements, and ground, of £1,323 3/7. We take it that this rather portentious outlay was for new works, as there is a fairly liberal disbursement for repairs to buildings and grounds under the heading of maintenance charges. This £7ll odd, with the items under capital expenditure, consti- , tute a rather formidable item, running into considerably over I £2OOO. It is about the past and contemplated future in this connection; the taxpayers are entitled to all the information the Board can possibly give. And in this we are not, as our, Wanganui contemporary suggests, hastily seeking to find grievances concerning the increased assessment, nor are the taxpayers likely to revise the opinions they have already formed, until rthe information is forthcoming that will entirely make the necessity for such assessments clear to them. Taking up a course of reasoning which seems to have been followed by our contemporary we are entitled to say that, so far, ■ few have ventured to condemn the Board’s financial methods; to have loj.o eo on; right would indeed have he* u indiscreet; neither have- they even accused the Board of wild or wasteful expenditure, which is quite a different thing to suggesting or thinking that they might have been doing something that involved an undesirable or questionably necessary outlay, and in making that the point to answer seems like an effort to obscure the real issue. Aider looking through the statement carefully we do not think any member of the Board would challenge any item of administration or maintenance —although in conjunction with capital, expenditure an eye ought to be kept on the expenditure for repairs, etc. — and they might pass without comment the expenditure on charitable aid and public health, but when it comes. to capital expenditure dhe Board ■ should be absolutely frank with its' contributing bodies, divulging all its premeditated intentions. With the increase in the levy and the increased value recently put upon ‘property by the Government. valuer, this year’s receipts should more than double those collected in 1914, and as £3,574 was the amount then received, it is only reasonable that those who are asked to furnish the funds should want to know what the Board 1-s going to do with them, (f some large extension of hospital buildings is contemplated in Wanganui, then it is time for this end to seriously consider the (juestion of forming a se.prr-'W-Hospital District. \