The Waikato Times THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 1879.

Waikato Times, Volume XIII, Issue 1155, 20 November 1879, Page 2

The Waikato Times

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 1879.

Equal and exact justice to all men, Of whatever state or persuasion, religious or uolitioal. Hero .shall the Press the People's right maintain, TJnawed by influence and tmbribed by gain.

To put the finances of the country on d sound basis has been the talk of the Assembly for the last two or three sesaions, but the Colonial Treasarer (Major Atkinson) has brought the House and the country face to face .with the task m a manner which leaves no alternative bat to grapple boldly with it. To carefully read the able statement made on Monday night is to rise with a mingled feeling of regret ana" thankfulness — regret that a young and prosperous colony " with abundant natural resources, with excellent credit, and with an increasing ordinary revenue, notwithstanding great commercial depression," should be found m so involved a financial position — and thankfulness that the Government which, intent on theoretical legislation and the welfare of the whole human race, neglected the re^l business of the country, had not a

sufficiently extended lease of office to plunge u=» irretrievably into national bankruptcy.

As it is, the colony must enter rigorously on a thorough : system of reform. Every possible expenditure of a non-reproductive character must be pared down to the narrowest limit, and all classes alike must be content to bear their »hiu*e of increased taxation. By mate ing the close of the financial year the 3lsl March instead ot tho 30th June, three months of the estimated deficit of the present year will be avoided, and nearly five months have already passed, the, deficit for these five months having been met by tbe late Government by the issue of Treasury bills to the extent 0f. £600,000. It is proposed to make good the deficiency between now and the end of March by loans to be anthorised by the House. So far then/ that is nntil the end of March next, the deficiency will have been supplied, not out of revenne, but by adding to the general indebtedness of the colony. It is with the new financial year that the difficulty comes, for' the deficit of nearly a million is shown to be" a permanent one, and this it h proposed shall be mainly met, first by discontinuing the subsidies to local bodies, a saving of 1 £275,000— the loss of them being made up from another source — and secondly by increased taxation which, imposed at once, will have by that time commenced to yield a steady return of revenue.

The chief increase sought to be effected is m the imposition of a property tax, by which it is estimated a revenue of £470,000 per annum may be raised. In this tax tho land tax: is to bo merged, the proposed object being ,to tax all realised wealth, not merely land but houses, mortgages, baok shares, &c. So far good, but m doing this the very people whom a land tax should specially catch will come off the easiest — namely, the men who purchase large blocks of lands, and hold them unimproved for speculative purposes. All lands will be taxed equally, the blocks of 10,000, 20,000, . and, 100,000 acres of, land and the . farm if improved, and occupied by its . owner. In each cases the first «£ 3OO m value will be exempt, and that is all ; for the tax will be levied on the improved value of real property, which is estimated from the returns furnished under the Land Tax Act at about £100,000,000. To this the personal property owned m the colony, calculated at £18,000,000, is added, and after deducting £5,000.000 on account of the ,£3OO exemptions it is reckoned that there will be a taxable sum of £113,000,000, which will r yield, at a penny m the £>, the yearly revenue of £470,000. The Colonial Treasurer, as a reason for including personal property under the tax, very properly says, " Why, I wish to know, should the farm of the hard working pioneer seotler, or the irontsge of the struggling city traelesman be taxed, while bank .shares, mortgages, and other such property are allowed to go free." Bat the working aettler, the man who has invested his money and labour m the reclamation of his land will naturally ask,if he is to be taxed not merely for his land but for improvements . also, why should the land speculator, whose estate is rendered valuableby the outlay of the working settler, escape with a imerely nominal amount of taxation. Without the outlay and expenditure of the bona fide occupiers and improvers of the soil the large estates of the speculator would remain for ever the howling wildernesses that too many of them now are. Against this, doubtless, it is argued that the tax now imposed is one levied solely forrevenue creating purposes and not as a political tax to check the holding of land on purely speculative objects — that, up to its full value, an improved farm is so much realised wealth,andthatablockofunimproved land is worth just so much, as raw material, and no more — that tho money invested m improvements m the one case is taxed and the money of the capitalist not invested m the land but held m bank shares, mortgages and other stock is got at under the head of personal property. There may be some truth m this, but we have a liking for the political tax, and though we have no wish to see an excessive tax placed upon unoccupied lands, a tax which would render the temporary holding of large blocks for speculative purposes prohibitive, there is, however, we believe, a happy mean which, while it would not drive capital from the purchase of land m large blocks for resale, would impose a fair share of taxation upon the holders, and be sufficiently heavy to cause them either to utilize such lands by resale or cultivation. An income tax had been generall y looked for, but this has been altogether omitted from tho fiscal changes proposed by the Government. To this, however, it may fairly be said that to have imposed a tax both on property and income would have been to have dipped the taxgatherer's hand twice into the same pocket. As it is, the increased taxation has been fairly distributed on all classes, for out of £770,000, the sum of 06470,000 is directly levied upon property, while the same class will be called upon m the £300,000 raised by increased Customs duties to pay their share of that sum m addition.