HUGE FIGURES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 2 April 1942, Page 3

HUGE FIGURES

BRITISH WAR FINANCE EXPENNDITURE OVER £14,000,000 A DAY. REVENUE OVER £2,000,000,000 A YEAR. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, March 31. Expenditure in the last three months of the financial year which ends today is understood to have averaged £14,250,000 a day. The total expenditure in the year of £4,776,000,000 averages £13,000,000 a day. How the expenditure was made and how it compares with the expenditure estimated in the Budget presented last April is the subject of figures issued today. The Budget was based on a total expenditure of £4,207,000,000, which included the provisional figure of £3,500,000,000 for votes of credit. Votes of credit actually granted amount to £4,250,000,000, and supplementary votes for ordinary supply services to £3,000,000, so that the total estimated expenditure was increased to £4,960.000,000. The actual expenditure of £4,776,000,000 includes £4,085,000,000 for votes of credit. As regards revenue, after taking into account the yield (£150,000,000) of the new taxes proposed in the Budget, it was estimated that the total revenue would be £1,786,000,000. This has been exceeded by £288,000,000, the realised total being £2,074,000,000. The excess of expenditure over revenue—£2,7o2,ooo,ooo—has been covered by borrowings, including £442,000,000 from savings certificates and 3 per cent defence bonds, £724,000,000 from national war bonds, £577,000,000 from 3 per cent savings bonds and £192,000,000 from tax reserve certificates.