THE Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR O'CLOCK P.M. Resurrexi. TUESDAY, MAY 18, 1880.

Thames Star, Volume XI, Issue 3554, 18 May 1880, Page 2

THE Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR O'CLOCK P.M. Resurrexi. TUESDAY, MAY 18, 1880.

Under the heading of "The Assembly: what will it do ? " Mr Moss, M.H.B, for Parnell, has published a pamphlet in the New Zealand Herald. The arguments he uses are clear and straightforward, and coming from a gentleman" thoroughly acquainted* with figures cannot fail to carry weight. He attributes the present deficit to the Fox-Yogel Government of 1869, and not to the late Ministry. He says: "The colony had been in financial difficulty for some time, owing to native disturbances, and to the low price of our staple products in the Home market. A chronic deficit had perplexed and harassed previous Ministries, but this deficit the Ministry of 1869 made no; effort to overcome. . :.. „. . • The proximate cause of the reappearance o/the deficit is tbesudden falling off in the land revenues. In 1869-70 this revenue was only $382,070-. It increased year by year to £1,509,181 in 1877-8. In 1878-9 it fell to £869,729, and is not expected to yield £380,GG3 for the current year, ending on fjude 30th." These figures speak for themselves, and it appears, that the deficit has been inherited by .every Ministry in power since 1869. Those-wno are inclined to attribute this minus to any one particular ministry are committing a gross mistake, and are only speaking at the dictates of party, bias. Under the heading of Permanent Charges Mr Moss , ! says: " The annual charge for the public debt is £1,400,000 for interest, and £116,176 for the .sinking fund open to> reduction as the stock becomes inscribed. Meantime, wo have to provide i the full sum of. £1,516,170 less probably £100,000 for interest oh the unexpended portion of the last five million loan. This makes ss— ' .-:. , ;■■■; ■• ' : -" .' ■ ■ The first charge... .., ... £1,416,170 Amounts expended on the Oivil List, and under Special Aefca 70,324 .y . , ' £1,486,494 .These are called *' permanent" charges, and cannot) Ktfe?!iiniaediately reduced to ajble revenue to 1 meet these charges is 1 £1,751,705. This 5 from Customs, Stamps, liailways, Land Tax,*, and miscellaneous sources-—

"These are the only branches of the public service yielding *in available revenue. The other branches require more than their receipts to enable them to perform their functions. The whole of our available revenue—including the land tax, /since repealed—is therefore just ■ sufficient .to pay the permanent charges and leave a balance of only £265,000 to. meet the other costs of government, amounting, as will be presently seen, to £1,085,000, and showing a deficit in figures'of £820,000, I use the term "in figures " advisedly, because the appropriations have always included considerable sums that ought not to appear The experience of past years justifies a reduction of at least £150,000 on this account, making the real deficit £670,000, which the repeal of the land lax will bring up to £768,00,0. What will the Assembly do in face of this deficit ? Will it still insist on imposing new burdens, or will it first insist on the Ministry exhausting every fair and proper means to reduce the cost of gorernnient, so largely inflated during the inflated decade through which we have just passed ?"■ Speaking of Retrenchment and Taxation, Mr Mbss condemns the Property Tax as being sweeping and heavy, and a bastard imitation of the American system, preserving its worst features, while setting aside the local assessment and the local appropriation, which save the tax from being as obnoxious ie America as it is here. However, property ought' to take its share in the burden caused by expenditure from which owners have enormously beneiittrd out of all proportion to the rest of the community. " Ministers," says Mr Moss "in this matter, are between Scylla and Charybdis. On the one hand, they will alienate powerful supporters to whom taxation may cause inconvenience and loss. On the other hand, they will unjustly place a heavy burden on those least able to bear it, and will be assisting to sink lower those with whom the struggle for existence is already sufficiently keen. There can be no doubt which course any patriotic Ministry is bound to take, but it will need to be supported by an united and vigorous public opinion—the only power that can' force it, or force the Assembly to deal effectively and impartially with the large questions of retrenchment, reform and taxation that the colony J3 bound, at 'iis. peril now to face." ; ;

On the question of centralisation Mr -Moss is no less emphatic in his denunciation of the present system. To effect a real and adeqftate saving, local government in its true and most effective sense and with all its powers of voluntary local effort must be restored. Mr Moss speaks thus of the present system of legislature:" A Legislature sitting at a cost of £500 per day is an unsuitable machine to do the local work and local legislation now forced upon it. Last session a small amendment of the Slaughterhouse Act was introduced to suit the circumstances of certain portions of the Auckland province. The amendments were found to affect districts in Otago and in Canterbury, where the orginal Act was working satisfactorily. The Bill was referred to a select committee of members from those provinces. It was altered and re-altered, brought several times before the House, and finally dropped as impracticable. This little attempt at a bill must have cost altogether a day's sitting, equal to £500, and is a type of much of the work done, by the Assembly." Mr Moss concludes :

"■■■"As. the Assembly acquits itself in dealing with these large questions, so will it either commaud renewed confidence, or be regarded with increased mistrust by the people of the colony whom its finance has plunged into difficulty, whom its legislation has left without local government, and whom it has forced to depend upon its wisdom alone. May.it: rise to the occasion, and with true patriotism and singleness of purpose carry the colony as safely over its present difficulties is it has been carried over difficulties more perilous, and over times darker than the most gloomy imagination could now paint."

"To achieve this, a'House in earnest and a Ministry in earnest will both be needful. Neither of these can, nor will exist, if there be not at its back an earnest and a vigilant people. If, in the coming straggle, men would save themselves and save their families from, the crushing effect which unfairness in the incidence of taxation. must have upon them—if they would not see the public rights in native and in public lands made subordinate to the; profit of private pflrsons—if they would have the colony governed only in the interests of the whole of its people— they will not depeaci on the generosity or fho gracious consideration of any set or order of men. They will trust to themselves alone. They will, io a man, place themselves on the electoral roll while it is yet time, and so possess,a potential voice in deciding thoirowd destinies, the destinies .of their children, and the destinies of the country in the "crisis through which it is about to pass."