The Westport Times. AND CHARLESTON ARGUS. In the cause of Truth and Justice we strive. TUESDAY, JULY 4, 1871.

Westport Times, Volume V, Issue 833, 4 July 1871, Page 2

The Westport Times. AND CHARLESTON ARGUS. In the cause of Truth and Justice we strive. TUESDAY, JULY 4, 1871.

The oppressive taxation under which the mining industry labours in this Colony, and the question of by what means this burden is to be alleviated, will probably come under the consideration of the Colonial G-overnment. In addition to the Customs Duties, to which the miners contribute more largely than any other class from the fact of their supplies being derived almost exclusively from importation, and the stamp duty which they share in common with the rest of the community, they have to pay the gold export duty—a tax which, though easily collected and ungrudgingly submitted to, is nevertheless prejudicial to the employment of capital, and operates the more injuriously the larger the capital which is employed. The impolicy and the injustice of this impost have been fully admitted in the neighbouring colonies where it has been some time abolished. The steps taken by the Victorian Legislature to remove obstructions from the development of mining industry may be very appropriately followed in New Zealand. Provision should be made in the first place for its reduction, to be gradually increased until, in the course of a few years, it could be completely done away with. The chief obstacle that has stood in the way of this desirable consummation'has beenthe Provincial form of government. The gold duty is collected by the Customs, and immediately paid over to the credit of the Province to which it belongs, and, as will be readily understood, it forms a very important item of provincial revenue. Prom the Ist of April, 1857, to the 31st of March, 1871, there were nearly six million ounces of gold exported from this Colony, upon which the duty collected amounted to a little over £700,000. Of this sum Nelson's share amounted, in round numbers, to £130,000, but it would be a difficult matter to show any useful work carried out by this Province in return for this extraordinary source of income. The revenue derived from miners' rights, business licenses, registration fees, leases, and other items, known as goldfields receiptp, has been correspondingly large. Had these large sums been devoted to any national object the burden would certainly not have been lessened, but there would have been the satisfaction that the money had not been uselessly frittered away; whereas the fact is obvious that the land fund and goldfields revenue have been only useful to sustain a double form of government, which is at once expensive and inefficient. The duplicate machinery, as may be. expected, works anything but harmoniously together, and the sooner one set is taken away the better for the Colony.