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THE FINANCIAL STATEMENT. [BY TELEGRAPH.— OWN CORRESPONDENT.] Wellington, Friday.

AtlTßef following is the concluding poition COf^hejFmfuicial Stat niei.t :—

Land Purchase Liabilities. The land purchase liabilities on 31st s March has, as shown by tho roturn laid upon the table of tho Houso according (o .\a.\v, amounted to £285,400, as against £309,299 the pie vious year, but as honourable gentlemen aie aware only £200,000 'was set apaib undor "The Three Million Inan Act, 1882," for tho purchase of native land, the House having approved of the abandonment of such of the pmposed pur chases a.s tho Government did not think desirable to proceed with. Of this £200,000 £53,000 lias baen spent up to the 31st March last, and it is estimated that by abandonment of such purchases as I have referred to tho balance of £143,(500 will be sufficient to cover tho liabilities.

Roads and Bridges Construction Act. Out of £3)0,203 standing to the o.odit of the fund available undei tho Road-, and Bridges Coustn.ction Act £10!>,39S lia^ , been expended. Of this £89,490 was on account of main loads, and £10,902 on account of district roads. The liabilities outstanding; on the main loads account aio £1G0,483, and upon tho dKtiict road, account, £43,777.

Public Works Fund. . The balance of the Public Woiks Fund remaining unexpended on the 31st Maidi last, including tho balance, i'SS.'HJO, of the Bccond instalment of the loan of 18S2 to about one million a ye.n was not, I think, foi-icen when the act was passed. For example, to exactly spend £1,000,000 per annum on public woik* with only €1,000,000 per annum in cash avail.iblc would, under any ciicumstances, be next floor to an impossibility, and m the ca c o of i ail ways it is altogethci impossible. The woiks may bo loughly divided int.) three elites, viz: -(1) Foitnation and budges ; (2) mateiials foi p^unanent way, and (3) plate-laying and stations, and each of tho,e items absoibed neatly a third of the total amount. Jf, theicfore, tho formation on moit lines be done duiuur the first year, it would bj necessary th.it the whole of the woiks m tin- countiy should be fatopped dumifthe second yen, in older to pay diiium that yeai foi the rails and sleopcis, and then to pioudo tm tho laying of the iaiK and the making of the stations dm ing the? thud yeai. If, howevei, the work m the countivbj con tinned dm ing the second >eai it is evident that the late of expeudituio onginally pioposed must be over-run, and this in fact has to some extent occmiod. The Government have, theiefoie, whene\er en cum stances apppeared to justify such a couise, veiltmed to .slightly exceed the anthonty directly given by Paihament in oideiing rails and rolling stock, so as to pie\ent the works leinaining at a standstill loiigoi than was absolutely necess.uy, and tins actum on the part of the Government will explain to those meinbeis how it came to pass that the expenditmo and liabilities togethei exceed the votes by the sum of Oil. 3!)!>. 1 may inform the committee that thcie i^ mateual to the \alne of about L'oOO,0&0, consisting of rolling stock not set up, iails, either in the hands of the (!o\ eminent, on the sea, or being made to tho oidei of the Agent-General. 1 desiie to call the attention of the Committee to these facts, bef.iuso if the Government could exceed a vote of Paihament m committing their country to expenditure or liabilities without tho attention of Pailianvnt lwmg spscially called to it, it will be foi Pailiament to detoimine if the action of the G< - vernment in thus exceeding the votes by liabilities for the nntenal foi futmo u-c was justifiable. Had we not acted a, we have done, one of two things must ha\e happened, either some £2150,000 less must have been spent on t!.e v>oiksofthe hue-, thus lendei ing the depletion still gieater than at piesent, or iaiK and Killing stock to that amount must ha\eie.nained unoideied to t!ie gieit del ly of the w.u'vs oji oif lly in the fut'iie In the Public Woiks Statement made in 18.^2, it was pointed out that a laige exponditiue would be lequued t«'i w«.iks i.p«»n ihe opened lines, and it was pioposeri to allocate a laigc sum out 'if the balance of the five million loa.i foi this pmpose, the sum avail.ible has. T lcjitt to --ay, been found quite inadequate to meet tho neees saiy expend ituie, lely ing upon t'natpiopos d as being suflicient to meet tin; ier[mienients of the public set \ ice, no fuither diuvt ]»o\ ision was made in tho schedule to ths tlnee million loan Act. foi the nai^Ki) inipio-sement on (lie open lines which tl'o increasing tiafhe is pmpetually di'inanding, such f"i instance as inticiscd lolh.ig stock, furthei st ition accommodation. It i^ tine that a laij,u poiti.m of tin uijii'ii dituic might mulct the Loan Act, ISB2, be chained upon the lines named in the schedule. but this mode of ihai^in" doe- not appe.u satisf.u - tory t ) the Gowinim nt, and no pio\isiou has been made foi a numbi i of the open lines upon vnich .i Luge r\ ponclitui e has been found ncci- aiv. At any i.ite, it is cleaily a quest'on winch lequues the speu.il coiisideiatniii ot J\ ill inieiit. Under the autho-ity of the \ote-, of I'.uli.uueut, liabilities h i\e be mi inclined, and exponditute made upon the open lines duung the two yeais since .'ilst Maich, IMS 2, to the extent of *> 50,000 Of this, J..J')0,000 has been chained :.L r ainsfc (ho fne million loan, leaving £.570,000, whiJi i- at piescnt charged under section 40 of tho Appropua tion Act of last >eai to the loan . ccount, for wnich fuithei ways and means will have to be pKAidod, in the amount will ha\e to become a peimanent chaige against the loan. It will be necessary, a'so, to in ike gome proM&ion for fuither expenditure upon open hnss which cannot p )ssibly be avoided. I feai that a sum of not less than £100,000 will be ie-|iiued to be exIjended annually upon the open lines, jebides all chaigeo ioi lcnewals, maintenance and rep^ns, which aie of course charged against the leceipts if the lailv nys aie to keep picj with the met easing tiaffio. Under ordin.try ciicumstinces, id would now be my duty to submit foi the consideration of the committee the pioposcd expendituie of the ouhmr> ie\enuefoi the curiont year, and then to ask the attention of lmn. nicinbeis to the estimated ie\euue which it was intended to meet such expcndituie. but as mattois htand m this House J ha\e only to ask the committee to giant <uih'icient >upj)lies to cany on (he public sol \ ice until the meeting of the new Paihament shall have decided how the exponditiue upon open lineb has to be ultimately chaiged Ido not pio pose to ask the committee to considei estimate-, of tl'o, expenditnie, cither of the Consolidated fund or of the Public Woiks fund, but obtain the nece&sry authoiity foi expendituie by amendment of the Public Revenues Act, which w ill extend the appiopiiatious of last year, with such few additions as may be neccwuy until the end of August next. I shall ask the authoiity of Parliament to issue £1 "50,000 deficiency bills to provide foi the deficiency in tho Consolidated fund to the 31st Maich last. These bill* will be in addition to the €400,000 at present authorised to be laised m tempoiary aid of the levenue. I miy here say that I am of opinion, from the expenditure of last yeai, that £100,000 of the deficiency bills are barely sufficient to carry on tho public sei vice without the nskof incut ing serious difficulties. These difficulties aii.se chiefly from our basing to pay at certain periods of the year large suir.s for interest and sinking funds before the, consolidated revenue has accumulated sufficiently to meet the necessary ppyments. The revenue comes in invgulaily fiom Customs and railways, and especially fiom the property ta.x, which is collected only once or twice a year. I propose, therefore, upon the present occasion, as the pioperty tax cannot bo collected within the current half year, to ask for fuither power to issue dificieucy bills to the extent of £50,000. With this additional amount of ways and means, and if the House sec fit to grant authoiity to raising the extia £150,000 of deficiency bills to meet the deficit in last year's ic\enue, T think there will bo no difficulty in making all necessary payments until the meeting of the new Pailiament. With lefeience to the Public Works fund, I have stated that thcie was an unexpended balance of £877,912, but of this £202,484 was advances in the hands of officers, and as lion, members who follow the public accounts know, advances outstanding:, although included as balance in hand, are not really available as expenditure. These outstanding advances vary „ . from time to time from £00,000 to £300,000. The expenditure during April and May has , been rather heavy, amounting to £278,894, s , thus leaving the unexpended balance of the jj-Aji tuid ,on the lfet June last £078,229. But of Ifcfcms amount £290,731 was advances. ', The #||fekpehditure for .Tune, July aiid August i|fWjl! be less per month than the expenditure |®'f<s^April and May. The expenditure foi mffiwfi- May, though large, would have |||||pn3rr&duany tailed «>ff> month by month |||||ffcu $h e floating of the next million of the

three-million loan, but owing to the large expeudituie which has been found necessary during the last two years on the open lines, and the action which the Government has taken in ordering rails, sleepers, and rolling htock, so as to expedite the works, it. will be necessary to obtain some tempoiary .iid for the Public Works fund, until, aft I have Mild, the new Parliament has determined how the expenditure on the open lines is to be charged, and until tho raising of the throe million loan. A table showing, among othci things, tho expenditure and liabilities of each vote authorised m tho schedule of the Loan Act of LSB2 will be published with this statement. Tins table will, I think, enable lion, members cleai ly toundeistand the position of tho fund. T shall ask the House to permit tho issue of deficiency lnlU to the extent uf 41100,000. Tins will be ,u(h'cient until about the beginning of September. Since the tlnee million loan was authoiisud the c.xpendituic of the Public Woiks fund has been for 1882-83, £897,037. Last yeai it was £],409,r>50, making a total expenditure for the two vtMii ii])o;i public woilc-, of £2,30(5,025. But thisamount includes £151,127 advanced for pm chases of tails fm the open line-., which will be icpiid by the Working Railway Depaitment as soon as the rails ainve and are handed o\er. The nett expenditure for the tw o years v> as therefore £2,152,498, or an annual average expenditure for the two years of £1,070,249 mclv.she of £101>,39S of expenditure nuclei the Roads and [judges Construction Act, so that the .neiago expenditi re n little exceeds the one million a-\oar winch tho Government estimated the colony might safely sp'Mid, and this expendituio would h.i\o been £300,000 less, had not the Go\ eminent ti ken upon themselves, as I have ah cad y pointed out, to oulei slecpcis, rails, and lolling stock, m anticipation of the requnement-. of the curient yeai. And now, Mr Ilanihn, I should like to -.ay a few words about the depression which pi avails in the colony, ft the iii.st place, it does notarise to any appiociable extent eithci froiu defective laws oi emu-> of administiation on tho pait of the Government. It doej not .vise fioiii the vuthdiawal of capital or fiom the disluist of capitalists. Theic is no sign of such distiust anywheie, as f.ir as I know. Capital can now be obtained in : any amount, and u))on icasonable terms, foi any undertaking which will give n fail lotmn foi the outlay mcuiicd, Capital has not, a, a niattei of fact, been dii\en fiom urn sliou*-, either by our sj-.teni of duvet taxation, oi by the natuic of oui land law-., oi by any othm caiHC. Fai nine capit.il has flowed into the colony dining tho last tlneo yeais than m any equal penod of om hNtoiv. Noi docs the di>])jos-ion aiise fioiii the laige amount of ]nteie->t we have to pay upon oui public debt and pihato b-u rowing. We can, I am -atished, pay with easo all the niteie^t we ha» c undeitiken to piy, because the emijloynient of the bonowod capital has enabled, and is enabling, us to pioduce far nioie than the .shaie oui >lecp'iig ]>aitnei-. fliaw in the way of nitoicit, and thii must be evident to anyone who will loilv.it tho amount ot oui expoits, aid lenieiiibci that this is the sui plus nfh'i oui ])o]iulation has siipjihed itself with ill the chief neee^ai let. of life, and especially when the enoimous dnect a<l\a'itage to the pn)dnccis, which acoiui^s fiom the community, of at least two millions pei ye v .

Causes of the Depression. Tlie picscnt rie])ie-.Mon is ti.iceable ultimately to tlnce causes: — Fust: The habits of cxti avagance aiising out of the wondeiful piospenty winch, with only slight and tempoiai y checks, wo have enjoyed foi the last thutocn yens, habits which our real cucunistincps ne\ev justified v-> in indulging, if any cncumstancea could be then justification. This extiavagance is no»v, I lejoice to think, becoming fully lecogmscd as an e\il, and successfully combattc'l. (Secondly : The class, of dis tnbuteis and middlemen is fai too nmneious ni piopoition to out population. Theie aieno doubt too many ineichants, tiaders, and agents. XuinbiHs of these aie tiading upon cipital boi io,\ed upon teiins wb'ch mike it impossible for tliein to do business upon i sound basis and the consequence is th.it they, mteifeie with and nun the legitim i to bis mess of the lespoiisible nei chant ami tiadei. It is geneially admitted by all eomp 'tent authoiitieo that in the je%i ItSB2 o\er imi)oitation of goods to the value of at least one million tteihng has taken place, and I find upon nirninv th.it the stocks in the bonded warehouses, wine piacticaliy equal in value in J>ecenibei, ISS.'i. to those ,n December, 1882, so th.it the lehef which was hoped for last vcar m the 1 eduction of stocks has failed us for the piosont Thndly : The c\tiaoidmaiily low puces which have obtained duimg the last je.ii foi oui chief <v bu U■> of e\poit — wool and gt am. Ft is sud that wool and gram .uo norn low in pi ice at the same tnno, and this is no doubt tme as a geneial mle. Unfoitunatcly, hovvevei, this has not pun or 1 tiuo dining the last year. The loss to oui spending pouei uj)on tliese two aiticks of cxpoit has been estimated at not less than lialf-a million steilmg. [ myself believe that had wool and giain maintained anything like aveiage pi ices, we should have had no deficiency in the consolidated levenuo to piovide foi. These causes sufficiently account for the w.mt of confidence in our immediate piospects, and for the dcpicssed condition of tiade in some distucts of the colony. Our real circumstances do not justify this lack of confidence, but theie can be no doubt that it is an impoitant factor in the piesent depies bion, and that we cannot hope for a letuin of piospcnty until confidence has, been again lcstoied. As I have on sevcial occasions pointed out, the action of Parliament and the Government have to a certain extent intensified the depie.ssion by the detci initiation which was ariived at two years ago to limit to a model Ate extent the expenditure of bonowed money. As lion, membeis will have. seen from the statements which I have just made, the Government have not aibitrauly ciu tailed the expendituie by d hard and fast line, but have pndeavouied to make the i eduction as little felt as por-Mble by incieasincr the expenditure during the cm rent year to the full extent of the limit imposed by Parliament. Mow the piesent depiction is to be speedily oveicoinc is a quoitum of groat importance to all of us. L confess at once that I see no loyal mad by which we cj.ii be relieved fiom the present dullness. The only remedies me, to live well within oui means, to luciease as largely as possible the number of producers by settlement on the lands of a class of pei sons able and willing to cultivate them, by encomaging the consumption of local pioducts and manufactures, to believe m oui >elve=, and to iet.olute]y set our faces against the expenditure of public money from lcvenue or loan on purposes unneco-s.il y or unptofitable, while at the same time we steadily push on our public vvoiks If we determine, its I believe we shall, to follow such a coui^e as this, then our pioipoiity is I ventuie to say, already ai lived. Had it fallen to my lot, Sir, to have submitted a complete budget for the cm lent year, my pioposals would not have necessitated my asking Pailiament for any mci eased taxation for the purpose of carrying on the services of the year, as I saw my way to make both ends meet, with a fair margin for contingencies, by means of leforms under the proposals for the lefonn of the Civil Service, which the Government have had under consideration, by the savings which would have been effected under our hospital and charitable aid proposals, and by the savings upon other votes to which we should have by the action of the House given effect.

Conclusion. In conclusion, Mr Hainlin, I would point nut that witlnn six months after the Hall Government took office, which it did in October, 1880, the Government had to face a deficit of one million sterling upon the ordinaiy revenue. This, ah I have often said, arose chiefly from the falling off in the land revenue upon which we had been 1 dying. The Government at once hot to work to face the deficit. In the first place it excluded the land fund altogether as a source from which the ordinary expenditure might be met, charging against it only the cost of its own administration, and the charges to which it was locally liable, and setting apart the balance for local works, and to these purposes it has been applied ever since. The deficit of ono million for the period ending tho 31st March, 1880, had to be met by a permanent loan, and the expenditure for the following year balanced with the revenue by means of very laige reduction in expenditure and considerable increase of taxation. At that time, for some years preceding, and for two' yeais subsequently, a large portion of the charge for Armed Constabulary was borne upon the loan. Our five million five per cent, loan had been sold in December, 1879,' at £97 10.«, with, the • option of converting into a four per cent, loan 1 and £120— in other* words our four per cent. 1 stock their sold for £S1 ss. This sale was. undoubtedly, at the, time a most successful one, »Bnd( certainly, represented our credib in a njo,st favourable ' light. In 1880 there ivasi a-^inall 'deficit in the Consolidated fund. In 1882 there was

a surplus of £203,000. The opportunity wa? therefore taken in that year of transferring the charge of £75,000, then paid out of loan for constabulary, to the Oonnpli* dated fund, and taxes were reduced to the extent of about £110,000. In 1883 thero was a surplus of £35,000, notwithstanding the huge i eduction of taxation which took place m ISS2, and the fact that tho consolidated fund was charged for the first time with the whole cost of the Armed Constabulary, an additional charge amounting to about £75,000. In 1884 wo ha\ c to face a deficit ot £152,000. This has arisen from the falling off in the railway receipts to the extent of £56,000, and in the Customs duties of £123,000. Upon looking at the circumstances under which tho estimates of 1882 were made, I cannot say I believe either estimate was above what might have been reasonably expected. The deficit is to be regretted, but it is ceitainly not a matter about which we need ha\e any anxiety. It can be provided for without unduly burdening any class of the community. Moreover, our credit never btood higher than it does in London at the present time. Our last £100,000 4 per. cent loan realised no less than £100 0b o'd per cent. We have, Sir, .so far as my judgment goes, nothing in our present circumstances to dishearten us— nothing, Sir, but what should nerve us to renew our exertions with the certainty that great prosperity will again reward our efforts. Meanwhile, periods of pressure may be on the whole beneficial to tho community in forcing attention to economy in our affairs, public and private, prudence in our speculations, and better oiganisation of our industiicH and our administration Waste is more or less an incident of all human work, which the greatest skill, sagacity, and prudence cannot wholly eliminate, and the tendency in times of excessive confidence is to neglect the attempt. It is generally admitted that but for this fact, our laige colonial enterprises of the last fourteen ye.irs would have been a more signal success If the country and legislature are capable of profiting by "tho uses of adversity," our future progies« as a people will lii D ie than compensate in its inmw-ed stability for whatever it may sacrifice in swiftness.

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Waikato Times, Volume XXII, Issue 1867, 24 June 1884, Page 4

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THE FINANCIAL STATEMENT. [BY TELEGRAPH.—OWN CORRESPONDENT.] Wellington, Friday. Waikato Times, Volume XXII, Issue 1867, 24 June 1884, Page 4

THE FINANCIAL STATEMENT. [BY TELEGRAPH.—OWN CORRESPONDENT.] Wellington, Friday. Waikato Times, Volume XXII, Issue 1867, 24 June 1884, Page 4

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